Avi Schiffman, a teenager in Washington State, created a coronavirus tracker website that has more than 30 million visitors each day.Schiffman thinks the connections with VCs and investors might be helpful to him in the future. Avi Schiffman has been procrastinating on his school work, but he has a good excuse.
Avi Schiffman's coronavirus tracker is a one-stop shop for all the information about COVID-19 the average person might want to know. It constantly updates with statistics for countries around the world on infections, deaths, recovered, and rates of change using data scraped from the WHO, CDC, and other government websites. The site frequently offers new features, like the new survival rate calculator.
And it is a big responsibility. The night before we talked, Schiffman told me that he'd been up until 7 am fixing an issue with the dashboard. He estimates that he's put at least a few hundred hours into the site, one time staying up 50 hours straight. "It's taken over my life," he said, though he was quick to add that he will "gladly take on the pressure."Because the tracker covers the entire world, there's always someone checking it.
"I'm only 17, I don't need $8 million...I don't want to be a profiteer," he said. At first, he was almost reluctant to talk about ads, which he says everyone asks about. Then, he explained his reasoning. Schiffman said that he didn't want popups ruining the UI, which would be something out of his control if he sold the site. He doesn't want to be contractually obligated to keep up the site, or to make changes that he doesn't agree with.
"I don't want it to leave a stain on things in the future...people think I'll regret that decision, but I plan to do many things in the future." Schiffman has big plans for his future. He's already gotten job offers, including one from Microsoft, but he isn't interested in accepting one of those jobs now, plus he wants to keep pursuing his own projects and "the last thing you want to do is code more" after a day at work coding.
Félicitations et respect !
I'll rather invest 8M
Wao fr?
What a great example of doing something for ‘the greater good of humanity’. I find people want to attain morals like this so frequently but are just as quickly disregarded by so many. Bravo for sticking to your own moral compass, I have no doubt you’ll make future headlines again
BillGates
Sounds like he’s getting really bad advice and needs better financial people around him
Sounds like a kid
Because he never had to pay bills HeIsImmature LittleVirgin