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Brent Bushnell
Brent Bushnell
01:16

Brent Bushnell

Two Bit Circus

Los Angeles, CA USA

"Reject the cultural narrative that there's one road to take. It's different for everybody and changing faster now than ever before."

Career Roadmap

Brent's work combines: Engineering, Technology, and Building Things

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Day In The Life

Co-Founder & CEO

I run a high-tech circus. We're a band of nerds building big entertainment using modern technology.

My Day to Day

As the CEO, we joke I'm the "chief email opener". I spend a lot of time meeting with people and figuring out who are partners will be.

Skills & Education

Advice for getting started

This all started as a passion project for fun to see what crazy things we could build. We had no idea that what we were doing was "art" until people started calling it that. After we embraced this, everything opened up for us.

Here's the path I took:

  • High School

  • Bachelor's Degree

    Electrical and Electronics Engineering - Did Not Complete

    University of Colorado Boulder

  • Bachelor's Degree

    Computer Science

    University of California-Los Angeles

Life & Career Milestones

My path in life took a while to figure out

  • 1.

    Went to school for electrical engineering for a while; was in college during the first big "web craze."

  • 2.

    Was itching to enter the workforce, so he dropped out of school to move to San Francisco, the epicenter of tech.

  • 3.

    Says he wanted to try a bunch of different stuff: worked as everything from a furniture salesman to a sushi chef.

  • 4.

    Believes the world presents you with endless opportunities and you can't let yourself get bogged down by what you "should" be doing.

  • 5.

    Met his co-founder Eric Gradman; the two started making interactive art, gained more and more traction; turned it into a company.

  • 6.

    The goal of their company was to "rebrand what it means to be an engineer," get more kids into the fun side of science.

  • 7.

    Encourages combining your interests; says there's a lot of creativity and opportunity to be found "at the intersection of domains."

  • 8.

    Loves the quote, "No battle plan survives engagement with the enemy"; you should have a plan, but don't stick to it rigidly.

Defining Moments

How I responded to discouragement

  • THE NOISE

    Messages from Myself:

    We're not artists!

  • How I responded:

    This all started as a passion project for fun to see what crazy things we could build. We had no idea that what we were doing was "art" until people started calling it that. After we embraced this, everything opened up for us.

Experiences and challenges that shaped me

Click to expand

  • My first go at college, I didn't finish. During the rise of the Dot-com bubble, all I wanted to be doing was working. I left school, moved to San Francisco, started my own company and began to dabble in a lot of different things.