Definitely not, but the NYT article really places emphasis on him being a developer, a "programming whiz", and calling the algorithm "his". This might just be m

Definitely not, but the NYT article really places emphasis on him being a developer, a "programming whiz", and calling the algorithm "his". This might just be misleading out of ignorance or just as a side effect of trying to build hype. It's certainly massively unsubstantiated, especially given the back story and that the polished version came after acquiring a competent team. I am certain that any founder of any startup that has grown at least moderately would not consider the core application "his algorithm", and most certainly would not acknowledge such publicly. I highly doubt Zuckerberg would say that Facebook (as it is now) is his code. But even with more knowledge of what's happened, I think my sentiment stands. If you can't easily afford to build/fund a team, getting a project to a point that you can convince people to contribute in some way without relying on affluence or age-based hype-potential is significantly more impressive.