If you grew up in the late 90s or early 2000s, you know what the McAfee Antivirus is. It was somehow present in every single computer whether you wanted it or not, and despite your most heroic efforts, it was impossible to remove. All it did was ask you to pay for the full version and constantly annoy you with popups. This isn’t a rant about that though.
This is about the creator of that software – Mr. John McAfee himself. And it’s a tale of drugs, murder, cults, international notoriety, and well… more drugs.
Let’s start at the beginning. After college, John worked at a string of companies, including NASA and Xerox. But he was constantly losing jobs during this time because he was basically drunk and coked out all of the time. In fact he was also selling cocaine at one point, and once got fired from a job because he showed up to work while under the effects of DMT, an extremely potent drug.
His big break came as a result of viruses hitting computers in the 80s. He decided to create an antivirus, and McAfee Associates was born, raking in the moolah. At one point he controlled 67% of the antivirus market.
However, this guy wasn’t your regular boss, and his penchant for wild behaviour started rubbing investors the wrong way. At McAfee associates, things like sex contests and sword fights were part of the routine, which didn’t bode well for investors looking to scale the company. So they replaced him, but he cashed out for a cool $100 million.
By the 2000s, things got weird again. John suddenly became a yoga guru in a $25 million mansion, where he housed 200 ‘disciples’ for free. By most accounts, it was basically a cult.
He even wrote 4 books during his entire ‘spirituality’ phase, though he later denounced them and called them trash. He soon got bored of this kind of life however, and instead started dealing in property. However, the economic collapse ensnared him, and his fortune dropped from $100 million to just about $4 million.
He then decided to move to Belize, where he started making ‘organic antibiotics’. This was basically a drug manufacturing hub, and the authorities tried arresting him. But he was never charged.
During this time in Belize, John began to get increasingly paranoid, and started indulging in dangerous bath salts like MDPV. This is a drug that apparently turns you into a sex fiend, and he claims that some of the other people he did it with tried to have sex with his dogs.
In 2012, McAfee was called for questioning in connection to the murder of American expat Gregory Viant Faull. Faull, who had died of a gunshot wound, was McAfee’s neighbour. Instead, McAfee fled the country.
McAfee claimed that he thought the police would kill him, and he therefore escaped, even though it was routine questioning.
He escaped to Guatemala, where he was arrested for entering illegally. While detained, he faked 2 heart attacks, which allowed his attorney time to prevent his deportation to Belize.
He was then deported to the United States, where he now resides. There, he met his wife, a prostitute who tried to solicit him but who he ended up marrying. He has openly stated that he has 47 biological children.
So that’s the life of the tech-world villain that is John McAfee. The guy even hates his own creation! No shit – when his products were no longer marketed under his name, he said,
I am now everlastingly grateful to Intel for freeing me from this terrible association with the worst software on the planet.
And by the way, this guy is running for president in 2020. Yes, we live in a crazy world.