I have been fascinated by computers since childhood. My fist computer was ZX Spectrum 128 (it looked just like a keyboard, it had an inbuilt BASIC interpreter, and all the programs were stored on audiotapes). It was my first introduction to programming, and I can say I liked it very much.

Life went on, and I had to decide what to do with my life next. I didn't even think about becoming a programmer since that time it wasn't something I felt I could do for living: there was no Internet and I had to make decision basing on what I knew that time and on the opinions of the people around me. But I was good in physics and mathematics, so I decided to become an engineer.

After 6 years of studying I graduated from one of the Russian tier-1 universities with a master degree in engineering. I even managed to graduate with distinction.

After working a few years in the realm of engineering I started to understand that it's not what I really liked to do. I can't say it was completely uninteresting: there were a lot of sources of interest for me. But it wasn't what I was fascinated by. With a wide spreading Internet access I started getting more access to the information. And eventually it dawn on me that I could work as a programmer. This was what I really wanted. It was a bit radical but then I thought "Why not? I have only one life!".

So I decided to delve into the sphere of programming.

I signed up for Stanford on-line classes in Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning and Databases and successfully did them. They took a lot of time and it was a bit challenging for me to work as an engineer and to have to combine studying and working. Still it was a fascinating experience. Now Stanford is starting a new set of classes. And I'm definitely going to sing up for several of them.

What will happen next is in my hands. I'll try my best to become what I really want to be!

Just for those who are interested, my profile in LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/pub/oleg-golovin/24/307/848