Conversation

Who are humanities people who’ve had a major hand in shaping the Internet? Two I know of are Peter Thiel (philosophy) and Alex Karp of Palantir (‘neoclassical social theory’). Jonah Peretti wrote a cultural theory paper that’s supposedly the genesis of Buzzfeed. Who else?
23
115
Replying to
William Gibson (coined the term cyberspace) Bruce Sterling (did hacker activism at one point) Vernor Vinge's True Names I know was widely read by early internet people probably other SF writers could qualify
2
1
Replying to
That's a reach. They helped shape the culture but can hardly be credited with actually shaping it at a technological level. That kind of thing is rare. Arthur Clarke with geostationary satellites and Star Trek with cellphones come to mind as clear SF --> tech influences
Replying to and
Some people tending tor are humanities majors, but not the technology innovators... That early Bitcoin collaboration maybe had some William&Mary types, but who can tell; Wales was finance; Benioff bus. admin, Ellison, early drop-out; hard question, even early agile was E.E. folx