Romi Jamil Ezzo (b. April 23, 1991) is a crowdsourcing and gamification enthusiast. He is the Director of Communications at Everipedia. He has been actively involved in contributing to and generating ideas for crowdsourcing projects since he was 16 years old (circa 2007). He has contributed to projects among the likes of Rap Genius (now Genius) and ArmchairGM.

Ezzo was born in Boynton Beach, Florida. When he was 5 years old, he and his family moved to Kuwait. He spent his next 12 years there, including his high school years.

After graduating from the American School of Kuwait in 2008, Ezzo attended Ithaca College and earned a Bachelor's Degree in Public & Community Health. Subsequently, Ezzo graduated from Syracuse University's Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs and received his MPA.

While at Syracuse University, he was an active member of the Maxwell Women's Caucus ^[5] and the Coalition of Multicultural Public Administration Students (COMPAS).

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Ezzo first learned about crowdsourcing after receiving an inbox message on MySpace in June 2007. It was from Daniel Lewis, one of the four co-founders of a sports wiki called ArmchairGM.^[18] Lewis recruited Ezzo to the website after a conversation about how ArmchairGM had an active forum (similar to what MySpace groups were at the time), along with several other gamification features. The site rewarded you with points for every contribution you made, which motivated users to write articles, edit their favorite athletes' pages, and receive points in the forums.

Ezzo accepted, as he thought it would be a better platform to achieve his dream of one day becoming a sports writer.

He ranked second all-time in points before Wikia absorbed the site's encyclopedia articles and blanked all of its old blog entries. ^[9] This discontinued ArmchairGM in its original form.

Nevertheless, Ezzo continued his aspirations to become a sports writer in 2010 by contributing to Bleacher Report in 2010.^[17]

In March 2011, Ezzo was Googling lyrics to manually add to his iPod.

He searched for lyrics to a DJ Khaled song and noticed a website with which he was unfamiliar; he was used to reading lyrics on AZLyics and MetroLyrics. Out of curiosity, he clicked on the Rap Genius link and noticed a few highlighted lines that explained the meaning and provided context for the lyrics. After doing some research about the site, he learned that this was another crowdsourcing project.

He signed up for the site on that day.

Rap Genius co-founder Mahbod Moghadam (known on the site as Maboo) ^[10] made him an editor and a moderator within one month.

Ezzo eventually became one of the top 15 contributors in Genius IQ; these are points that track the value and contributions someone brings to the site.

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When Rap Genius changed its name to Genius in 2014, he made an effort to run a daily baseball blog on Sports Genius. In it, he tracked and annotated all the home runs hit on that day. It is a continuation of one of the popular series on ArmchairGM where he ran a daily community poll for who hit the most significant home run during the MLB season. ^[4] His inspiration came from an old commercial in the 1990's entitled, "Chicks Dig the Long Ball" (starring Tom Glavine, Greg Maddux, and Mark McGwire).^{[11] [666666]}

Ezzo was a digital marketing coordinator for DM3: an organization dedicated to providing services and accredited courses related to digital marketing.

^[666666] His led a content management team, being responsible for the company's content marketing strategies. He also got involved with clients'search engine optimization, web analytics, and advertising campaigns on Facebook.

One of Ezzo's most notable clients was ICDL Arabia for whom he wrote annual cyber safety reports in 2015 and 2016. ^[16]

In January 2016, the company was acquired by ICDL Arabia.

By January 2016, DM3's agency and institute were acquired by ICDL Arabia and Ezzo was considered an ICDL employee.

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In May 2016, Ezzo became the lead copywriter and researcher for ICDL Arabia's sister website Online Sense, which aims to inform parents, teachers, and teenagers on social media updates, apps, and how to stay safe online. ^[7] Online Sense labels itself as the first website to create cyber safety tips in both English and Arabic. ^[7]

In addition, he wrote guest blogs for UAE news publishers to raise awareness about emerging online issues and new tactics people might use for malicious purposes.

His name has appeared in 7DAYS ^[14] and WhichSchoolAdvisor.^[15]

In May 2015, Ezzo read a job description on Facebook from Mahbod Moghadam noting he was looking for interns at his newest venture, Everipedia. In late 2018, Romi had a streak of 73 straight days posting 200-1000 word stream-of-consciousness posts to Facebook. ^[2]

Since June 2016, Ezzo has been an active user and a Master Editor on Everipedia.

^{[12] [13]} He now works closely with Everipedia's staff. His main priorities include aggregating evergreen content for existing pages, creating lists, and search engine optimization.

In the first week of March of 2017, Ezzo flew to Los Angeles, California to start a trial period for Everipedia; he worked there for two months. He eventually became an official member of Everipedia's full-time team on September 7, 2017 after resigning from his job in Dubai and flying back to L.A.

Since January 2018, Ezzo has been the Director of Communications at Everipedia.

Ezzo enjoys stream-of-consciousness writing and reading in his spare time. His favorite section of the bookstore is the "Biographies" section. ^[666666]

He enjoys discussing politics, as well.

A self-proclaimed independent who doesn't vote during U.S. Elections, Ezzo enjoys listening to podcasts, including the Joe Rogan Experience, The Ben Shapiro Show, Louder with Crowder, and the The Majority Report. Other podcasts he enjoys include The Tim Ferriss Show, the Jocko Podcast, the Tony Robbins Podcast, and TED Radio Hour. His favorite YouTubers offer political commentary, including Tim Pool, Gad Saad*,* Don't Walk, Run! Productions, Cracked, the Amazing Atheist, Chris Ray Gun, and Shoe0nHead. ^[666666]

His favorite comedians include George Carlin, Bill Burr, Jon Stewart, and Louis C.K. ^[666666]

Ezzo's favorite sport is baseball.

He traveled to Saudi Arabia and Dubai to represent Kuwait for their national team in 2002 and 2007, respectively.

Later in 2007, he and the team visited Kuwait's American Embassy and met George W. Bush. ^[666666]