Nguyen Ha Dong: “I was born under pressure, so it is best to remove Flappy Bird”

Tram Ho

On the evening of November 18, Nguyen Ha Dong appeared at a sharing event with students at Hanoi University of Technology – the school he used to attend. A few days earlier, the game developed by Dong’s Flappy Bird was voted on the list of 25 most influential applications in the past 10 years by US technology site Cnet .

Millionaire born in 1985 dressed simple, quiet, proved humble and sometimes somewhat shy to share in front of the crowd. Before each question of the program coordinator – Dr. Ta Hai Tung – Director of the Institute of Information and Communication Technology (Hanoi University of Science and Technology), Nguyen Ha Dong answered very briefly and went straight to the interior. dung.

“I was born under pressure, so it’s best to take it off.”

Flappy Bird was uploaded to Apple Store by Nguyen Ha Dong in May 2013, unexpectedly famous in January 2014. By February 2014, this game has become the most downloaded application in more than 100 countries and reached over 50 million downloads.

Answering the question of the secret of success, Dong shared, “For me for the past 17 years, I only had a computer screen, so I did not have many stories to tell. I think I have to trade a few things to get such success. What I trade for is my growth. ”

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Nguyen Ha Dong is developing a new game with a similar success rate to Flappy Bird as 0.1%. Photo: Bloomberg

“Nguyen Ha Dong earns an estimated amount of up to 50,000 USD / day. Even Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook, at first did not get rich that quickly, ”Dr. Ta Hai Tung quoted the Rolling Stone article about East in an article 5 years ago.

The doctor also recalled that the former student of Hanoi University of Science and Technology quickly removed Flappy Bird in February 2014 even though at that time this game was “causing storms”. Talking about his decision, Dong explained simply, “I was born with unbearable pressure so it is best to remove it”.

Previously, Dong had shared with Rolling Stone about whether he received emails from people who lost their jobs or mothers no longer talked to their children because of Flappy Bird. The pursuit, the criticism and accusations made Dong feel tired, insomnia and did not want to go out.

Leaving the story of “The bird flapping its wings”, Dong said he was developing a new game product with a success rate like Flappy Bird of 0.1%. “I don’t want to say it first because it is hard to say it. The game looks very simple but the level of technology in this game has never been there, ”he revealed.

Already millions of dollars but not thinking of retirement

Nguyen Ha Dong started programming at the age of 15, programming games at age 17, working for the game company from the second year of university and working by himself since 2011. However, he said that there was no main answer. to the question “Should I start a business as a student?”.

“I think everyone is different, so as long as they feel right,” the 34-year-old programmer said. He also reminded the young people “not to trade your maturity for short-term success”.

When asked about funding for startups, Dong said that with students who need money to implement their projects, he will give them money, not invest. The East condition is to prove the feasibility of the project, how much is needed and what is spent. If it is reasonable he will sponsor. In 2017, Dong shared that he would sponsor 5 student projects each year, with the maximum amount of VND 200 million / project.

Talking about making products, Dong thinks the same everywhere, there is no international or Vietnamese concept. “I judge from an angle if I’m not a human being. How to convince people to use their products, ”he said.

Regarding retirement plans, Nguyen Ha Dong shared that in the past, when he was a student, he thought that when he had 1.1 million USD, he would retire. “After that, I had many times that number but I still didn’t want to retire,” he said.

Flappy Bird is a mobile game developed by Nguyen Ha Dong. This game was “addictive” for many people around the world because of how to play very simple but difficult to eat points. Despite being removed after only one famous month, Flappy Bird helped Nguyen Ha Dong to be on the list of 10 Internet millionaires rising from the 2014 number of The Richest. In 2015, he was also voted by Forbes Vietnam in the top 30 under 30.

Nguyen Ha Dong and Flappy Bird appeared in Guinness 2016 as the first game to be downgraded after leading the AppleStore rankings.

TechTalk via NDH

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Source : Techtalk