Vint Cerf
lorenetworkingops culture
The co-designer, with Bob Kahn, of TCP/IP - the protocols that turned separate networks into one internet - and joint recipient of the 2004 Turing Award for the work.
Cerf and Kahn did not invent a network; they invented the agreement that lets networks that were never designed for each other exchange packets, which is why the citation reads for internetworking rather than for a protocol. Born in New Haven in June 1943, Cerf has had a hearing impairment since early life and has attributed part of his interest in networking to its promise as another channel for people who cannot use a telephone easily - a detail worth keeping, because the most consequential communications protocol of the century was partly motivated by someone who found the existing one hard to use. He has spent the decades since as the most public advocate the internet has, which is a job nobody appointed him to.
Also known as: vinton cerf, cerf