About John Carmack

John Carmack, born August 21, 1970, is a computer programmer, who among some circles is most well known as being one of the co-founders of id Software, and one of the primary developers behind the games Doom and Quake, released in 1993 and 1996 respectively. After many years at id, he resigned in 2013 to join Oculus VR. At the present moment (2026), he runs his own startup company, Keen Technologies.

John Carmack at GDC 2010
John Carmack Working on Quake II

Why I respect this person

  1. He revolutionized computer graphics.
  2. He open-sourced his game-engine code at a time when very few developers were doing this.
  3. I personally learned many incredibly valuable skills from studying and exploring the game-engine code that was released.