Robert Metcalfe
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Robert Melancton Metcalfe (born April 7[1], 1946 in Brooklyn, New York) is an electrical engineer from the United States who co-invented Ethernet, founded 3Com and formulated Metcalfe's Law. As of January 2006, he is a general partner of Polaris Venture Partners.
| Robert Metcalfe | |
 Robert Metcalfe wearing the United States National Medal of Technology (2003).
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| Born | April 7, 1946. Brooklyn, New York, United States. |
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| Residence | United States |
| Citizenship | United States |
| Fields | Computer networking |
| Institutions | MIT, Xerox PARC, 3Com. |
| Alma mater | MIT, Harvard University. |
| Known for | Co-invention of Ethernet. |
| Notable awards | National Medal of Technology, IEEE Medal of Honor, IEEE Alexander Graham Bell Medal, ACM Grace Murray Hopper Award. |
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[edit] Biography
Metcalfe graduated from MIT in 1969 with two S.B. degrees, one in Electrical Engineering and the other in management from the MIT Sloan School of Management. He then went to Harvard for graduate school, earning his M.S. in 1970.
While pursuing a doctorate in computer science, Metcalfe took a job with MIT's Project MAC after Harvard refused to let him be responsible for connecting the school to the brand-new Arpanet. At MIT's Project MAC, Metcalfe was responsible for building some of the hardware that would link MIT's minicomputers with the Arpanet. Metcalfe was so enamored with Arpanet, he made it the topic of his doctoral dissertation. However, Harvard flunked him. His inspiration for a new dissertation came while working at Xerox PARC where he read a paper about the ALOHA network at the University of Hawaii. He identified and fixed some of the bugs in the AlohaNet model and made his analysis part of a revised thesis, which finally earned him his Harvard PhD in 1973.[2]
Metcalfe was working at Xerox PARC in 1973 when he co-invented Ethernet, a standard for connecting computers over short distances, with David Boggs. Metcalfe pegs the exact day Ethernet was born: May 22, 1973, the day he circulated a memo titled "Alto Ethernet" which contained a rough schematic of how Ethernet would work. "That is the first time Ethernet appears as a word, as does the idea of using coax as ether, where the participating stations, like in AlohaNet or Arpanet, would inject their packets of data, they'd travel around at megabits per second, there would be collisions, and retransmissions, and back-off," Metcalfe explains. David Boggs offers another date as the genesis of Ethernet: November 11, 1973, the first day the system actually functioned.[3]
In 1979, Metcalfe departed PARC and founded 3Com, a manufacturer of computer networking equipment. In 1980 he received the Association for Computing Machinery Grace Murray Hopper Award for his contributions to the development of local networks, specifically Ethernet. In 1990 Metcalfe lost a boardroom skirmish at 3Com in the contest to succeed Bill Krause as CEO. The board of directors chose Eric Benhamou to run the networking company Metcalfe had founded in his Palo Alto apartment in 1979. Metcalfe left 3Com and began a 10 year stint as a publisher and pundit, writing an Internet column for InfoWorld. He became a venture capitalist in 2001 and is now a General Partner at Polaris Venture Partners. He is a director of Pop!Tech, an executive technology conference he cofounded in 1997.
[edit] Awards
Metcalfe was awarded the IEEE Medal of Honor in 1996 for "exemplary and sustained leadership in the development, standardization, and commercialization of Ethernet."[4]
Metcalfe received the National Medal of Technology from President Bush in a White House ceremony on March 14, 2003, "for leadership in the invention, standardization, and commercialization of Ethernet", having been selected for the honor in 2003.[5] In May 2007, Metcalfe, along with 17 others, was inducted to the National Inventors Hall of Fame in Akron, Ohio, due to his work with Ethernet technology. [6]
[edit] Incorrect predictions
Outside of his technical achievements, Metcalfe is perhaps best known for his 1995 prediction that the internet would suffer a catastrophic collapse the following year; he promised to eat his words if it did not. During his key note speech at the Sixth WWW International Conference in 1997, he took a printed copy of his column that predicted the collapse, put it in a blender with some liquid and then consumed the pulpy mass.[7] [8] This was after he tried to eat his words in the form of a very large cake, but the audience strongly protested; the cake was quite good[citation needed] and was eaten by some of the audience after the speech.
During an event where he talked about predictions at the Eighth International World Wide Web Conference in 1999, a participant asked: what is the bet?. He stated that there was no bet as he was not ready to eat another column.
Metcalfe is also known for his harsh criticism of open source software, and Linux in particular, predicting that the latter would be obliterated after Microsoft released Windows 2000:
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- The Open Source Movement's ideology is utopian balderdash [... that] reminds me of communism. [...] Linux [is like] organic software grown in utopia by spiritualists [...] When they bring organic fruit to market, you pay extra for small apples with open sores – the Open Sores Movement. When [Windows 2000] gets here, goodbye Linux.[9]
[edit] Selected publications
- "Packet Communication", MIT Project MAC Technical Report MAC TR-114, December, 1973 (a recast version of Metcalfe's Harvard dissertation)
- "Zen and the Art of Selling", Technology Review, May/June 1992
[edit] References
- ^ Robert Metcalfe, Inventor Profile. National Inventors Hall of Fame (n.d.). Retrieved on 2007-10-19.
- ^ Internet Pioneers - Bob Metcalfe. Retrieved on 2007-12-07.
- ^ The Legend of Bob Metcalfe. Wired (1998-11). Retrieved on 2007-12-07.
- ^ IEEE Medal of Honor Recipients. IEEE (n.d.). Retrieved on 2006-08-19.
- ^ Recipients of the National Medal of Technology. United States Technology Administration (2006-07-24). Retrieved on 2006-08-19.
- ^ Inventors to be honored on Capitol Hill. Retrieved on 2007-02-08. (currently inaccessible)
- ^ Sage who warned of Net's collapse eats his words. Reuters (1997-04-11). Retrieved on 2007-01-12.
- ^ Eating My Collapse Column. North American Network Operators Group (1997-04-16). Retrieved on 2007-01-12.
- ^ Linux's '60s technology, open-sores ideology won't beat W2K, but what will?. Infoworld (1999-06-21). Retrieved on 2007-01-12.
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
- An interview with Robert Metcalfe
- Interview ITworld
- A more detailed interview
- Video - The History of Ethernet
- Why IT Matters
| Awards | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Joel S. Engel, Richard H. Frenkiel and William C. Jakes, Jr. |
IEEE Alexander Graham Bell Medal 1988 |
Succeeded by Gerald R. Ash and Billy B. Oliver |
| Preceded by Stephen Wozniak |
ACM Grace Murray Hopper Award 1980 |
Succeeded by Daniel S. Bricklin |
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