computer science

An Aristotelian definition requires a very specific syntax.

It goes, an A is a B that's CS.

An A is a B that's CS.

Right.

The A is a specific term you are defining.

The country's really good at math, and we are very rigorous, very good at the sciences.

So there is a really strong culture, but, like, computer science was not taught in high school.

So, like, if you're good in math and science, you end up, like, being a doctor.

I...

I saw this music video that was filmed like a musical where I just like walk through all the fun things that everybody was doing.

And I was like, well, you know, my heart is really calling for doing something fun and expanding my horizons.

And it was only at Yale that I realized I liked entrepreneurship and that I liked computer science.

So at Yale, did you know you wanted to be a founder or was it like a class that you took that interested you?

Today's guest is Chris Hively, entrepreneur, investor, author, startup community builder, and a pioneer in digital mapping.

Chris studied geography at a time when his own father wondered what he could possibly do with it, combined it with computer science, and went from making maps for the US State Department to a printing company in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, where he was hired to computerize a business that had been drawing maps by hand for decades.

Out of that work came MapQuest, the first major commercial web mapping service.

Chris stepped away just as the online mapping world took off, and what came next was anything but a straight line.

You discover geography, and you tell your dad that you're gonna major in it.

He says something along the lines of, "What the hell are you gonna do with that, son? Why don't you study computers or something like that?" But your response was something along the lines of, "I don't know what I'm gonna do, Dad, but I love doing this, so I'm gonna stick with it." At the same time, you have a college professor who maybe takes a different approach, and rather than telling you to give up geography, the thing you love, he suggests you bring computers into it.

So you end up studying computer science as well as geography.

I have to imagine that was a pretty rare thing back then, let alone now.

We flipped the whole recruiting concept from apply and we assess you to we assess you and then we recommend to Google these people and for Kohl's department stores these people because why would you compete? Why would I recommend the same people to the same company? So what did we find was predictive? If the only thing I know about you was your university, of course it predicts something.

But interestingly enough, The most elite, like a Bachelor of Computer Science from Stanford, a positive predictor if I wanted to hire you as a software developer.

Turns out resilience was more predictive of quality of code than a Bachelor of Computer Science from Stanford.

Now, almost certainly, if you went to Stanford, you're probably at least a little resilient.

And if you're resilient, maybe you went to an elite school.

My guest is Arda Gench, the co-founder and CEO of LiveAd Technologies.

Arda is a tech entrepreneur and product strategist who studied computer science at Northwestern before founding LiveAd to solve one of the hardest problems in modern media.

How do you monetize live streaming without ruining the user experience? LiveAds ad tech platform enables live streamers and creators across platforms like Twitch, Kik, and YouTube to run non-intrusive interactive overlay ads and live brand integrations in real time.

Having executed massive campaigns for global brands like the Walt Disney Company, McDonald's, Adidas, and Vodafone, Arda sits right at the intersection of streaming ad tech, Gen Z media habits, and the creator economy.