WhatsApp的創始人簡•庫姆是誰

In announcing Facebook's deal to acquire the Mobile-messaging app WhatsApp for $19 billion, Mark Zuckerberg said he's 'known Jan for a long time.' The rest of us, particularly people in the U.S., aren't as familiar.

在宣佈Facebook以190億美元收購移動消息應用公司WhatsApp的交易時，扎克伯格(Mark Zuckerberg)說他很久以前就認識簡•庫姆(Jan Koum)。但其他人，尤其是美國人，對簡•庫姆可能不是那麼熟悉。

Jan Koum co-founded WhatsApp along with Brian Acton, a former colleague at Yahoo, and is the mobile-messaging company's chief executive. He is taking on another big role: a Facebook board member.

簡•庫姆和他當年在雅虎(Yahoo)的同事布萊恩•埃克頓(Brian Acton)共同創建了WhatsApp，並擔任這家移動消息應用公司的首席執行長。庫姆即將擔任另一個重要職務：Facebook的董事。

But on his LinkedIn page, the 37-year-old Koum flies more under-the-radar. He lists himself as a QA tester and a senior tweet manager. If you want to know much more, he suggests, go see Brian's profile. During his decade at Yahoo, he worked in infrastructure and security engineering. By his own admission in listing his education -- barely graduating from MVHS in 1995 and dropping out of San Jose State University -- he had other things on his mind.

但在LinkedIn的個人主頁上，現年37歲的庫姆有着更多不引人注目頭銜和經歷。資料顯示他說自己是一名質量保證檢測員以及資深推特管理員。他建議，如果想了解他的更多情況，不妨去看看布萊恩的資料。庫姆在雅虎的10年任職於基礎設施和安全工程部門。他在介紹自己學歷時承認，在學校就讀的時候滿腦子裏裝的都是其他事。他1995年勉強從山景城高中(MVHS)畢業，後來從聖何塞州立大學(San Jose State University)輟學。

Like its founder, WhatsApp is a quiet company. Sequoia says WhatsApp didn't spend a single penny on marketing and is a veritable stranger in the U.S. -- there is 'no other home grown technology company that's so widely loved overseas and so under appreciated at home,' the venture-capital firm said.

和其創立者一樣，WhatsApp也是個不事聲張的公司。紅杉資本(Sequoia Capital )稱，WhatsApp沒有在營銷上花一分錢，在美國是個十足的生面孔。這家風投公司稱，還沒有其他一家本土科技公司在海外廣受青睞卻在自己的國家默默無聞。

Not that WhatsApp didn't toot its horn: Every two months the company announced its latest leap in monthly active users, usually to the tune of another 50 million. At last count, it had about 450 million active users.

但並不是說WhatsApp自己取得的成就不顯赫：每兩個月該公司就會發布每月的新增活躍用戶數，通常的增量爲5,000萬。最新數據顯示，目前WhatsApp的活躍用戶已經達到約4.5億。

In a December update, Koum said his company's focus was on messaging and only messaging -- no games, no advertising, no gimmicks. WhatsApp wants 'to get out of the way. We want to let people have a conversation.'

在去年12月公佈最新數據時，庫姆說，他的公司關注的是消息，也只有消息，不是遊戲，不是廣告，不是華而不實的東西。他說，WhatsApp希望放棄不必要的東西，讓人們順利交流。

In a Tumblr post on the deal Wednesday, WhatsApp investor Sequoia Capital talked about how Koum's experience emigrating to the U.S. as a 16-year-old, and desire to keep in touch with family back in Russia and Ukraine, helped shape his focus on conversations.

WhatsApp的投資者紅杉資本週三在Tumblr上發文宣佈上述交易時，提及了庫姆以前的一段經歷，說他16歲移民到美國時，非常渴望與遠在俄羅斯和烏克蘭的家人保持聯絡，這使他非常重視對話和交流。

Last May, Koum spent 30 minutes onstage at the D: Dive Into Mobile conference in New York. He talked through why the company was averse to advertising and selling the company (he said as much again months later), and why the app means so much to different people.

去年5月，庫姆在紐約D: Dive Into Mobile大會上發表了30分鐘的演講。當時他講到了爲什麼WhatsApp對廣告和把公司出售非常反感（幾個月之後他又說了這樣的話），以及爲什麼這個應用對於各類人羣都有非常重要的意義。