I'm the historian who has been maintaining a comprehensive guide to Ayyadurai's claims http://wwww.sigcis.org/ayyadurai. Now he's abusing Wisconsin open records laws to try to read my emails about him. http://tomandmaria.com/Tom/emailgrab
Everybody who has looked into this recognizes that Ayyadurai created an electronic mail system. Although not in 1978 -- his own timeline infographic used to say that the "first version of the system was designed and deployed" in 1980. He since changed his story since to 1978. He has screenshots of source code dated 1982 and a newspaper report (that just calls the program electronic mail, not "email") from 1980. No reason to think those things are faked. So yes, he wrote a program in 1980 when he was 16. He gave a box of stuff to the Smithsonian and says that the source code is in it. I have no reason to doubt that.
The problem is that to be the inventor of email you don't just have to make an electronic mail system. You have to make the first electronic mail system. So he would have to prove that none of the dozens, probably hundreds, of electronic mail systems documented between 1965 and 1980 deserve to be called "email."
I go through this is great detail at http://www.sigcis.org/ayyadurai. But that's the bottom line: you can't invent something that is already invented.
News of Ayyadurai’s wedding seem to clear up the “why now” question raised by some commentators on earlier posts. Ayyadurai apparently wanted the Huffington Post and other recent stories to amplify his claims before the inevitable surge in press coverage he could count on as a participant in a celebrity wedding.
Despite the Huffington Post retractions (made on his wedding day) this strategy seems to be working. The same pattern is taking place as with the 2012 wave of stories. Enough inaccurate material stays online to help dupe the next wave of bottom-feeding bloggers. For example, Time never retracted its credulous online interview with Ayyadurai from 2011 and, as Mike pointed out above, the Huffington Post still has the Chopra blog post from 2013. Those both slipped under the radar when they appeared, as did a concerted effort to write Ayyadurai into various obscure Wikipedia pages. It’s only when Ayyadurai gets high profile coverage (the 2012 print article in the Washington Post, the recent epic Huffington Post series) that anyone bothers to push back.
Celebrity gossip bloggers are doing an even worse job than personal technology bloggers of evaluating his claims. Here are a few from today’s coverage: Mail Online: “The pair met early last year when Dr. Ayyadurai - who owns the patent to email and is often credited as the inventor of the electronic mail system amid some controversy - was giving a talk at an event hosted by Deepak Chopra.” CBS News: “Ayyadurai, who holds the patent for inventing email, met Drescher a year ago at an event hosted by Deepak Chopra.” ABC News: "Drescher married the scientist, who is widely credited with having invented email -- at their home… Ayyadurai currently teaches at MIT and was profiled in 2011 in Time magazine for being the first person to hold a copyright for ‘EMAIL’” People Magazine: “Ayyadurai, 50, who holds the patent for creating email, met Drescher, 56, a little over a year ago when he gave a talk at an event hosted by Deepak Chopra, according to an interview he did with the Huffington Post.” The HP news article it links to is still up, and claims that “In August 1982, the U.S. government accepted a patent for an electronic intra-office messaging system called "email" from then-teenager V.A. Shiva Ayyadurai.”
It is almost as if the whole thing is a post-modern performance art stunt designed to highlight the failings of online media. A few minutes with Google would reveal that he does not currently teach at MIT, that he was not granted a patent on email in 1982, and that he is credited as inventor of email primarily by his friends, family members, and business partners. I have updated my online evaluation of Ayyadurai’s claims with a one paragraph summary at the beginning, but do not expect it to make much difference.
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Shiva wants to read my email
I'm the historian who has been maintaining a comprehensive guide to Ayyadurai's claims http://wwww.sigcis.org/ayyadurai. Now he's abusing Wisconsin open records laws to try to read my emails about him. http://tomandmaria.com/Tom/emailgrab
Re: Re: Re: Re: Where's the source code?
Everybody who has looked into this recognizes that Ayyadurai created an electronic mail system. Although not in 1978 -- his own timeline infographic used to say that the "first version of the system was designed and deployed" in 1980. He since changed his story since to 1978. He has screenshots of source code dated 1982 and a newspaper report (that just calls the program electronic mail, not "email") from 1980. No reason to think those things are faked. So yes, he wrote a program in 1980 when he was 16. He gave a box of stuff to the Smithsonian and says that the source code is in it. I have no reason to doubt that.
The problem is that to be the inventor of email you don't just have to make an electronic mail system. You have to make the first electronic mail system. So he would have to prove that none of the dozens, probably hundreds, of electronic mail systems documented between 1965 and 1980 deserve to be called "email."
I go through this is great detail at http://www.sigcis.org/ayyadurai. But that's the bottom line: you can't invent something that is already invented.
Is Ayyadyrai's Plan Working?
News of Ayyadurai’s wedding seem to clear up the “why now” question raised by some commentators on earlier posts. Ayyadurai apparently wanted the Huffington Post and other recent stories to amplify his claims before the inevitable surge in press coverage he could count on as a participant in a celebrity wedding.
Despite the Huffington Post retractions (made on his wedding day) this strategy seems to be working. The same pattern is taking place as with the 2012 wave of stories. Enough inaccurate material stays online to help dupe the next wave of bottom-feeding bloggers. For example, Time never retracted its credulous online interview with Ayyadurai from 2011 and, as Mike pointed out above, the Huffington Post still has the Chopra blog post from 2013. Those both slipped under the radar when they appeared, as did a concerted effort to write Ayyadurai into various obscure Wikipedia pages. It’s only when Ayyadurai gets high profile coverage (the 2012 print article in the Washington Post, the recent epic Huffington Post series) that anyone bothers to push back.
Celebrity gossip bloggers are doing an even worse job than personal technology bloggers of evaluating his claims. Here are a few from today’s coverage:
Mail Online: “The pair met early last year when Dr. Ayyadurai - who owns the patent to email and is often credited as the inventor of the electronic mail system amid some controversy - was giving a talk at an event hosted by Deepak Chopra.”
CBS News: “Ayyadurai, who holds the patent for inventing email, met Drescher a year ago at an event hosted by Deepak Chopra.”
ABC News: "Drescher married the scientist, who is widely credited with having invented email -- at their home… Ayyadurai currently teaches at MIT and was profiled in 2011 in Time magazine for being the first person to hold a copyright for ‘EMAIL’”
People Magazine: “Ayyadurai, 50, who holds the patent for creating email, met Drescher, 56, a little over a year ago when he gave a talk at an event hosted by Deepak Chopra, according to an interview he did with the Huffington Post.” The HP news article it links to is still up, and claims that “In August 1982, the U.S. government accepted a patent for an electronic intra-office messaging system called "email" from then-teenager V.A. Shiva Ayyadurai.”
It is almost as if the whole thing is a post-modern performance art stunt designed to highlight the failings of online media. A few minutes with Google would reveal that he does not currently teach at MIT, that he was not granted a patent on email in 1982, and that he is credited as inventor of email primarily by his friends, family members, and business partners. I have updated my online evaluation of Ayyadurai’s claims with a one paragraph summary at the beginning, but do not expect it to make much difference.