Chris Wanstrath (GitHub)

Born and raised in Cincinnati, Ohio, Wanstrath was drawn to programming at an early age when he discovered a love for video games and grew a knack for coming up with basic commands on a home computer. He began pursuing a degree in English at the University of Cincinnati, but found himself programming in his apartment instead of going to class and dropped out.

In 2005, he instead moved to San Francisco and took a job as software developer at CNET, where he met fellow CNET programmer PJ Hyett. In April of 2007, they both left their jobs to start their own consulting firm Err Free and by the end of the year they launched FamSpam, a website meant to facilitating sharing of photos or other files between families or groups.

Meanwhile Wanstrath had also started working with fellow college-dropout-and-San-Francisco-transplant Tom Preston-Werner on a website to make Git, a collaborative software editing program, easier to use. Joined by Hyett on the project, they launched a website called GitHub.com in 2008.