IT Legends: Technology's Most Pioneering and Innovative Heroes

Jon Postel: The Father of Internet Protocols Who Wrote The Rules for Connectivity One of the most important figures in the history of the internet is Dr. Jon Postel, the man who wrote the early rules for how the internet is connected today. He is often referred to as the “Father of Internet Protocols” and was instrumental in the development and maintenance of the Domain Name System (DNS). Postel was born in 1943 in Los Angeles and worked at both the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and the Information Sciences Institute (ISI) at the University of Southern California (USC). He was one of the earliest pioneers of internet protocols and wrote the first set of rules for how computers could communicate with each other. Postel was the main editor of several technical standards, including the Request for Comments (RFC) series, which is a collection of documents that set out the protocols for the Internet. He is also credited with the development of TCP/IP, the fundamental protoco...

Mitch Kapor: The Lotus Developer Who Pioneered Desktop Collaboration Mitch Kapor is one of the most influential figures in the development of the personal computer. He is best known for founding Lotus Development Corporation and inventing Lotus 1-2-3, the first widely used spreadsheet software. He also founded the Electronic Frontier Foundation and was the first chairman of the Mozilla Foundation. Born in 1950s in Brooklyn, New York, Kapor was a precocious student with a penchant for problem-solving and machines. He studied at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), graduating with a degree in psychology in 1973. In the late 1970s, he founded Software Arts, a software consultancy that eventually led to the invention of the first widely-used spreadsheet program, Lotus 1-2-3. Developing Lotus 1-2-3 was revolutionary, as it allowed users to run complex calculations and analysis on their own computers, instead of relying on large mainframes. The program also enabled users to wo...