A primeira entrevista em anos com Pavel Durov, CEO e fundador do Telegram

Bom, o aplicativo dispensa apresentações, e como vocês já devem saber alcançou recentemente 900 milhões de usuários ativos. É muita gente.

Eu assisti a entrevista completa e vou disponibilizar nesse post o seguinte:

• Alguns highlights na minha visão.
• Um resumo (em inglês) gerado por um bot dentro do próprio Telegram.
• E os links pra quem quiser assistir na íntegra em inglês e legendado.

1. No início da entrevista, ele menciona escolas experimentais na Rússia. Deu a entender que eram instituições acessíveis, onde era possível aprender idiomas, matemática e programação de forma prática. Isso chamou minha atenção, pois quem já esteve em uma instituição de ensino superior no Brasil sabe que é apenas teoria.

2. Muitos acreditam que o Telegram é um aplicativo russo, mas, na verdade, é o oposto. Durov revela na entrevista que foi coagido a vender seu primeiro empreendimento, que era nada menos que o 'Facebook' dos países da extinta URSS, conhecido como VK, e foi expulso de seu próprio país por se recusar a entregar dados de usuários envolvidos em manifestações políticas. O entrevistador destaca que Elon Musk e Zuckerberg não agiram da mesma forma em situações semelhantes.

3. Ele também compartilha diversas histórias de pressão de outros países para que entregasse dados de usuários. Confesso que esperava que ele mencionasse o Brasil.

4. Parece que o bilionário é uma pessoa minimalista, ele revela não possuir casas, propriedades, iates ou carros de luxo. Particularmente, achei seu discurso para justificar esse comportamento muito plausível.

5. O empresário revelou ser o único gerente de produto do Telegram e que a equipe de engenheiros conta apenas com surpreendentes 30 profissionais. Quem usa o Telegram sabe que é um número extraordinariamente pequeno para a qualidade do aplicativo. Os clients do app têm boa parte do código aberto, então obviamente há mais engenheiros envolvidos no projeto, mesmo que informalmente.

6. Ao ser comparado com grandes empresas de tecnologia públicas, como X, por exemplo, ele revelou ter questionado Dorsey no passado sobre o tamanho da equipe, sugerindo redução. A resposta foi que isso afetaria Wall Street e o valor das ações. Entendi que Dorsey mantinha os funcionários para evitar impactos no mercado. Isso nos faz refletir: aqueles que se consideram intelectualmente superiores por trabalharem em grandes empresas deveriam ser mais humildes, pois talvez estejam lá por razões como essa.

Vendo essa entrevista, fica evidente que Durov é um grande gestor, um gênio, superando as figuras já estabelecidas em que somos condicionados a acreditar.

Segue abaixo o resumo da entrevista pra quem não pode assistir.

00 min

1. Pavel Durov is the founder and owner of Telegram, a popular messaging app (0:17)
2. Pavel was born in 1984 in the Soviet Union, moved to Italy, and then back to Russia (0:42)
3. Pavel and his brother excelled in education, with his brother becoming a world champion in math and programming (3:25)
4. Pavel started a social network in Russia, which became very popular in post-Soviet countries (4:14)
5. Pavel faced challenges with the Russian government due to his beliefs in freedom of speech and assembly (6:07)
6. Pavel chose to leave Russia rather than comply with the government's demands (8:38)
7. Telegram does not spend any money on marketing (9:50)

10 min

1. Pavel Durov left his first company, VK, to prioritize freedom over wealth (10:46).
2. Durov's mission in life is to enable freedom for himself and others through platforms like Telegram (11:19).
3. Telegram was created due to the lack of secure means of communication, with Durov's brother designing the encryption (13:09, 14:11, 14:16).
4. Bureaucratic hurdles in various countries led Durov to move around before settling on San Francisco (14:47).
5. Durov faced an attack in San Francisco, leading him to reconsider the city as a base due to safety concerns (16:47).
6. Durov experienced pressure from the FBI and security agencies in the US, with attempts to insert backdoors into Telegram for surveillance purposes (18:38).

20 min

1. Moving to the UAE was a strategic decision due to factors like ease of doing business, tax efficiency, and neutral geopolitical alignment (21:07-21:52)
2. Telegram has faced zero pressure from the UAE government in the seven years since moving there (22:40)
3. Telegram receives requests from various governments, some legitimate and some crossing into censorship and privacy violations (23:25)
4. Telegram received conflicting requests from US Congress members regarding data sharing related to political events (24:14-26:08)
5. The main pressure towards Telegram comes from Apple and Google, who enforce strict guidelines on content in their app stores (26:53-27:25)
6. Telegram sometimes disagrees with Apple and Google's interpretation of their rules, leading to conflicts over content removal (28:10-29:10)
7. There is hope that conflicts with tech giants and governments will decrease as expectations become clearer and red lines are established (29:53)

30 min

1. Telegram aims to educate users on what is allowed and not allowed on the platform, believing that things may not necessarily get worse (30:09-30:15).
2. Governments draw a red line at allowing organized opposition to their rule, as seen in events like the Ukraine crisis in 2014 and the aftermath of January 6th, 2020 (30:20-30:37).
3. Telegram prides itself on being a neutral platform that does not favor any specific political side, contrasting with Facebook's public stance of tipping the scale in favor of certain movements or countries (31:13-31:48).
4. Telegram's channels are a popular feature that allows for one-to-many broadcast communication, enabling quick dissemination of messages to millions of subscribers (33:08-33:51).
5. Telegram's founder, unlike many other tech companies, owns 100% of the business to maintain independence and focus on the platform's mission and goals (34:19-35:16).
6. Telegram has raised outside funding through bonds and a cryptocurrency project but has not given up ownership or voting control to maintain efficiency and independence (37:20-37:52).
7. Telegram operates with a decentralized hiring process, selecting top engineers through competitions rather than having a traditional HR department, akin to forming a highly skilled team like Navy SEALs (39:04-39:45).

40 min

1. Running a company with fewer people can be more efficient, but public perception can hinder necessary changes (40:24).
2. Running a public company is generally considered less efficient due to accountability, redundancy, and bureaucracy (42:08).
3. Telegram has 900 million users and expects to reach a billion within a year, without spending on acquisitions or advertising, relying on the quality and features of the product to attract users (43:08).
4. Telegram prioritizes quality, independence, privacy, and freedom to attract users from other messaging apps (44:23).
5. Telegram acknowledges the responsibility of handling private data and takes precautions to maintain prudence and avoid being too accessible (45:10).
6. Telegram aims to remain a neutral platform that fosters collaboration and common ground, rather than taking sides, to prevent a more dangerous world (46:11).
7. The founder assumes his devices are compromised due to surveillance concerns and limited faith in U.S.-developed platforms for security and privacy (48:41).
8. The founder highlights the differing perspectives on spying, with governments viewing it as security while individuals see it as a violation of privacy (49:19).

50 min

1. The world is becoming less amenable to privacy due to governments becoming less tolerant of it. (50:23)
2. New secure hardware communication devices may be created to preserve privacy, similar to hardware wallets for messaging and voice calls. (50:44)
3. During COVID, people became tired and angry about restrictions on expressing opinions, leading to skepticism about freedom restrictions. (52:10)
4. The speaker's platform remained neutral during COVID, allowing critical voices on lockdowns, vaccines, and masking to be heard for balanced debates. (52:51)
5. The speaker believes in cycles of development and change in the world, indicating that current trends may not persist indefinitely. (51:11)
6. The speaker views Elon Musk's purchase of Twitter as a positive development for innovation and competition in the social media industry. (55:10)
7. The speaker values innovation, empowering creators, and fostering an ecosystem economy in the social media industry. (56:10)
8. The speaker had a meeting with Mark Zuckerberg more than 10 years ago, where Zuckerberg showed interest in the speaker's app platform but ended up copying aspects of it. (56:51)
9. Free speech is emphasized as a crucial value that transcends individual persons or organizations. (58:14)

• Link para a entrevista legendada: https://t.me/DicasTelegram/3602
• Link para o bot que fez o resumo: https://t.me/Meeting_summarizer_bot