Yahoo made waves on Tuesday when it announced that it hard-purchased Summly, a mobile news app created in the UK. As we reported earlier, the company bought Summly for about $30 million, but that's not even the most surprising news. Summly was developed by a kid.
It all started at home, where Nick D'Aloisio created Summly at the age of 17. The app essentially condenses news articles from around the Internet down to about 400 characters — that's less than three tweets, by the way — and gives readers the most important information, with an option to click and read the whole article.
D'Aloisio and two other Summly members will be joining Yahoo as staff, although D'Aloisio will be working at the company's London headquarters because, well, he's still in school.
"I've still got a year and a half left at my high school," he said to the New York Times.
While some people debate the idea that Yahoo is crazy for throwing down such an enormous sum of money for an app, D'Aloisio thinks doubters toss aside the app's potential.
"People are kind of underestimating how powerful it's going to become and how much opportunity is there," he said.
D'Aloisio taught himself all of his programming abilities, and with the help of investors such as Yoko Ono (really) and Ashton Kutcher (seriously), he was able to make his vision become a reality.
He's even got some advice for parents, saying that kids should be allowed to explore their interests as much as possible, because there's bound to be some sort of payoff in the end.
"If there's a natural curiosity, that'll lead to, eventually, some success," he told the Washington Post.
As for Yahoo's plans for Summly, the app has been taken down, but you can expect to see D'Aloisio's algorithm make its way into Yahoo mobile applications in the future.
As for the wonder kid himself, he's got to finish high school.
