A teenage entrepreneur who earned more than $100,000 as one of the early adopters of bitcoin and has since launched his own startup has told young innovators to "just be yourself" at WIRED 2015 Next Generation.

And don't worry if you'd just rather not go to school.

Erik Finman, 16, who is founder of Botangle, explained to attendees at London's Tobacco Dock how he switched schools several times due to bullying, over-work, or just finding himself unable to express his true personality until, eventually, he decided just not to go anymore.


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"In sixth grade our teacher would search our bags and grade our notes," he explained in one example. "I wanted to be myself... It really wasn't a positive learning environment."

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So he switched schools again. And again, and again, until High School -- where finally he decided to drop out.

Gallery: Teen founder Erik Finman: 'I will never send my kids to school' Gallery Gallery: Teen founder Erik Finman: 'I will never send my kids to school' + 6

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Honestly if I decide to ever have kids I will never send them to school. Erik Finman

after posting his story on Reddit, founded Botangle ("its mission is to replace the public school system because of my terrible experiences in it") and made his way to Silicon Valley, Turkey, Germany and finally to London, where he has just moved to push his startup to the next stage.


Botangle is a service designed to help you find your community -- whether that's roboticists, historians or any other group. That mission is clearly close to Finman's heart. "That's why I switched schools so often," he said. "To find a community where I could be myself."

Finman encouraged young innovators to continue to search out a space to be themselves, as honestly as possible. "Let go of what teachers, peers think of you, of what society thinks of you, and just be yourself," he said. "Honestly if I decide to ever have kids I will never send them to school [...] For kids that need to stay in school because they want to become a doctor... work on a lot of side projects."

And if the kids can't convince their parents to let them drop out of school entirely? "Jus do what you love," Finman said.