Editing Nicholas Negroponte

{{Short description|Greek American architect (born 1943)}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=February 2019}}
{{Infobox person
| name               = Nicholas Negroponte
| image              = Nicholas Negroponte USNA 20090415 cropped.jpg
| caption            = Nicholas Negroponte delivering the Forrestal Lecture to the [[US Naval Academy]] in [[Annapolis]], [[Maryland|MD]], on April 15, 2009
| birth_date         = {{Birth date and age|1943|12|1|mf=y}}
| birth_place        = [[New York City]], [[New York (state)|New York]]
| occupation         = Academic and [[computer scientist]]
| children           = Dimitri Negroponte
| website            = 
| footnotes          = 
}}

'''Nicholas Negroponte''' (born December 1, 1943) is a [[Greek American]] architect. He is the founder and chairman Emeritus of [[Massachusetts Institute of Technology]]'s [[MIT Media Lab|Media Lab]], and also founded the [[One Laptop per Child]] Association (OLPC). Negroponte is the author of the 1995 book ''[[Being Digital]]'' translated into more than forty languages.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Encyclopedia of the City|last=Caves|first=R. W.|publisher=[[Routledge]]|year=2004|isbn=9780415252256|pages=482}}</ref>

==Early life==
Negroponte was born to [[Dimitrios Negrepontis|Dimitrios Negropontis]] ({{langx|el|Νεγροπόντης}}), a Greek shipping magnate, competitive alpine skier and member of the [[Negroponte Family|Negroponte]] family. He grew up in New York City's [[Upper East Side]]. 
He has three<!--?--> brothers. His elder one, [[John Negroponte]], is the former [[United States Deputy Secretary of State]]. [[Michel Negroponte]] is an [[Emmy Award]]-winning filmmaker. George Negroponte is an artist and was President of [[the Drawing Center]] from 2002 to 2007.

He attended [[Buckley School (New York City)|Buckley School]] in New York, [[Fay School]] in Massachusetts, [[Institut Le Rosey|Le Rosey]] in Switzerland, and [[Choate Rosemary Hall|The Choate School]] (now Choate Rosemary Hall) in [[Wallingford, Connecticut]], from which he graduated in 1961. Subsequently, he studied at [[MIT School of Architecture and Planning|MIT]] as both an undergraduate and graduate student in [[MIT School of Architecture and Planning|Architecture]] where his research focused on issues of [[computer-aided design]]. 

[[Yona Friedman]] recalls having met Negroponte in 1964 when he was still a student at MIT, where he had discussed with Friedman his idea for an "Architecture Machine".<ref name=":0" /><ref name=":1">{{Cite book |last=Furtado C. Lopes |first=Gonçalo M. |title=Pask's Encounters: From a Childhood Curiosity to the Envisioning of an Evolving Environment |publisher=edition echoraum |year=2009 |isbn=978-3-901941-18-4 |volume=9 |location=Wien |pages=96}}</ref> The architecture machine is considered by Negroponte to be a machine collaborator, who engages in an ongoing architectural design process with a human peer. Both machine and human participants engage in a process of mutual training and growth with each other, in order to harness the interactive potential found in peer-to-peer collaborations during an architectural design process with man and machine instead.<ref name=":0" /> 

He earned a master's degree in architecture from [[MIT School of Architecture and Planning|MIT]] in 1966. Despite his accomplished academic career, Negroponte has spoken publicly about his [[dyslexia]] and his difficulty in reading.<ref>{{cite web|title=Q & A with Nicholas Negroponte|url=http://www.c-span.org/video/?202050-1/qa-nicholas-negroponte|publisher=C-SPAN|access-date=November 30, 2014|date=November 25, 2007}}</ref>

==Career==

===MIT===
Negroponte later joined the faculty of [[MIT School of Architecture and Planning|MIT]] in 1966. For several years thereafter he divided his teaching time between [[MIT School of Architecture and Planning|MIT]] and several visiting professorships at [[Yale]], [[University of Michigan|Michigan]] and the [[University of California, Berkeley]]. He also during 1966, had a role with [[IBM]] which could potentially provide funding for research to find means of using computers to help [[Architect|architects]], planners and [[Designer|designers]].<ref name=":2" /> He attended Avery Johnson's lab and seminars at the [[MIT Sloan School of Management|MIT Sloan school]]. He eventually met Warren Brodey, who Negroponte described as being “one of the earliest and most important influences”.<ref name=":2" /> According to [[Evgeny Morozov]], it was through Brodey that the ideas of "soft architectures" and "intelligent environments" became established in Negroponte's thinking.<ref name=":2" />

In 1967, Negroponte founded [[MIT School of Architecture and Planning|MIT]]'s Architecture Machine Group, a combination lab and think tank which studied new approaches to [[human–computer interaction]].<ref name=":0">{{Cite book| publisher = [[MIT Press]]| isbn = 0-262-64010-4| last = Negroponte| first = Nicholas| title = The Architecture Machine: Towards a More Human Environment| location = Cambridge, Massachusetts| year = 1970| url = https://direct.mit.edu/books/oa-monograph/5049/The-Architecture-MachineToward-a-More-Human}}</ref> The Architecture Machine Group was primarily concerned in addressing the potential of computers in architecture. Negroponte argued during this period that [[Computer-aided design|computer aided design]] was only making activities such as architecture "faster", and that the underlying spirit of the architectural machine group would be to explore the various possibilities for generating collaborating machines for architectural design.<ref name=":0" /><ref name=":1" /> The group took funding from [[DARPA]] and other parts of [[The Pentagon]] to explore early research in [[human-computer interaction]] and [[virtual reality]].<ref name=":2">{{cite news |last=Morozov |first=Evgeny |date=28 June 2024 |title=The AI we could have had |url=https://www.ft.com/content/c63dae2b-b0d5-4b27-a718-2cce165097b9 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://archive.today/20240629061324/https://www.ft.com/content/c63dae2b-b0d5-4b27-a718-2cce165097b9 |archive-date=29 June 2024 |work=Financial Times |location=London}}</ref> The contents of the research from the lab were composed into two books: ''The Architecture Machine: Towards a More Human Environment'' (1973), and ''Soft Architecture Machines'' (1976).<ref name=":1" /> Participants in the group included the [[Cybernetics|cybernetician]] [[Gordon Pask]], who visited Negroponte as a consultant and whose article "Aspects of Machine Intelligence" became the introduction to the section on machine intelligence in ''Soft Architecture Machines''.<ref>{{harvard citation|Furtado C. Lopes|2009|p=100}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last1=Negroponte |first1=Nicholas |title=Soft Architecture Machines |last2=Pask |first2=Gordon |publisher=MIT Press |year=1976 |isbn=978-0-262-36783-7 |editor-first= |location=USA |pages=6–51 |chapter=Aspects of Machine Intelligence |doi=10.7551/mitpress/6317.003.0003}}</ref>

In 1985, Negroponte created the [[MIT Media Lab]] with [[Jerome B. Wiesner]].<ref>{{Cite news| pages = 13| last = Schrage| first = Michael| title = An MIT Lab Tinkers With the Future of Personal Computers| newspaper = [[The Washington Post]]| date = October 7, 1985}}</ref> As director, he developed the lab into a laboratory for new media and a high-tech playground for investigating the human–computer interface. Negroponte also became a proponent of [[intelligent agent]]s and personalized [[Online newspaper|electronic newspapers]],<ref>{{Cite journal| issn =0036-8733| volume = 265| issue = 3| pages = 76–83| last = Negroponte| first = Nicholas| title = Products and Services for Computer Networks| journal = [[Scientific American]]| year = 1991| doi = 10.1038/scientificamerican0991-106| bibcode = 1991SciAm.265c.106N}}</ref> for which he popularized the term the [[Daily Me]].

===''Wired''===
In 1992, Negroponte was the first investor in ''[[Wired Magazine]]''. From 1993 to 1998, he contributed a monthly column to the magazine in which he reiterated a basic theme: "Move bits, not atoms."

Negroponte expanded many of the ideas from his ''Wired'' columns into a bestselling book ''[[Being Digital]]'' (1995),<ref>{{Cite book
| publisher = Knopf| isbn = 0-679-76290-6| last = Negroponte| first = Nicholas| title = Being Digital| location = New York| year = 1999}}</ref> which made famous his forecasts on how the interactive world, the entertainment world and the information world would eventually merge. ''Being Digital'' was a bestseller and was translated into some forty languages. Negroponte is a digital optimist who believed that computers would make life better for everyone.<ref>Hirst, Martin and Harrison, John (2007) Communication and New Media, Oxford University Press, p. 20</ref> However, critics such as [[Cass Sunstein]]<ref>Sunstein, C.R. (2001) Republic.com Princeton University Press</ref> have criticised his [[techno-utopianism|techno-utopian]] ideas for failing to consider the historical, political and cultural realities with which new technologies should be viewed.

In the 1980s, Negroponte predicted that wired technologies such as telephones would become unwired by using airwaves instead of wires or fiber optics, and that unwired technologies such as televisions would become wired—a prediction commonly referred to as the [[Negroponte switch]].<ref>Speaking at a Northern Telecom meeting in the mid-80s with [[George Gilder]]. Negroponte called it "trading places" Gilder called it "The Negroponte Switch". From ''Being Digital'', 1995, Negroponte, N. {{ISBN|0-340-64930-5}} p 24.</ref>

==Later career==
In 2000, Negroponte stepped down as director of the [[MIT Media Lab|Media Lab]] as [[Walter Bender]] took over as executive director. However, Negroponte retained the role of laboratory chairman. When [[Frank Moss (technologist)|Frank Moss]] was appointed director of the lab in 2006, Negroponte stepped down as lab chairman to focus more fully on his work with [[The Children's Machine|One Laptop Per Child]] (OLPC) although he retains his appointment as professor at MIT (Professor Post-Tenure of Media Arts and Sciences).<ref>''[https://www.media.mit.edu/people/nicholas/overview/ Person Overview ‹ Nicholas Negroponte – MIT Media Lab]'', at media.mit.edu (mit.edu)</ref>

[[Image:Kaye negroponte.jpg|thumb|right|[[Mary Lou Jepsen]], [[Alan Kay]] and Nicholas Negroponte unveil the [[$100 laptop]] in November 2005.]]
In November 2005, at the [[World Summit on the Information Society]] held in [[Tunis]], Negroponte unveiled the concept of a $100 laptop computer, [[The Children's Machine]], designed for students in the developing world.<ref>{{Cite news | last = Kirkpatrick| first= David| date=November 28, 2005| access-date = 12 December 2010 | work=Fortune| url= https://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2005/11/28/8361971/index.htm | title=I'd Like to Teach the World to Type}}</ref> The price has increased to US$180, however. The project was a part of a broader program by One Laptop Per Child, a nonprofit organization started by Negroponte and other [[MIT Media Lab|Media Lab]] faculty to extend Internet access in developing countries.

Negroponte is an [[angel investor]] and has invested in over 30 startup companies over the last 30 years, including [[Zagats]], [[Wired magazine|Wired]], [[Ambient Devices]], [[Skype]] and [[Velti]]. He has sat on several boards, including [[Motorola]] and [[Velti]].<ref>{{cite web|title=Velti Announces Date of AIM Delisting|url=http://investors.velti.com/releasedetail.cfm?releaseid=558800 |date=March 18, 2011 |website=Velti - Investor Overview |access-date=August 27, 2012|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120305193039/http://investors.velti.com/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=558800|archive-date=March 5, 2012}}</ref> He is also on the advisory board of [[TTI/Vanguard]]. 

In August 2007, he was appointed to a five-member special committee with the objective of assuring the continued journalistic and editorial integrity and independence of the [[Wall Street Journal]] and other [[Dow Jones & Company]] publications and services. The committee was formed as part of the merger of Dow Jones with [[News Corporation (1980–2013)|News Corporation]].<ref>''[[Wall Street Journal]]'', August 1, 2007. "[https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB118598565803884843 Text of Dow Jones Editorial Agreement]". Retrieved October 21, 2007.</ref> Negroponte's fellow founding committee members are [[Louis Boccardi]], [[Thomas Bray (writer)|Thomas Bray]], [[Jack Fuller (publisher)|Jack Fuller]], and the late former Congresswoman [[Jennifer Dunn (politician)|Jennifer Dunn]].

===Epstein funding comments===
In response to the controversy of the MIT Media Lab accepting funding from [[Jeffrey Epstein]] five years after Epstein's conviction for sex trafficking minors, Negroponte told MIT staff, "If you wind back the clock, I would still say, 'Take it.'"<ref>[[MIT Technology Review]], September 4, 2019. "MIT Media Lab founder: Taking Jeffrey Epstein's money was justified". [https://www.technologyreview.com/s/614264/mit-media-lab-jeffrey-epstein-joi-ito-nicholas-negroponte-funding-sex-abuse/ Online edition]. Retrieved September 7, 2019.</ref>

Negroponte said that in the fund-raising world these types of occurrences were not out of the ordinary, and they should not be reason enough to cut off business relationships.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.technologyreview.com/s/614264/mit-media-lab-jeffrey-epstein-joi-ito-nicholas-negroponte-funding-sex-abuse/|title=MIT Media Lab founder: Taking Jeffrey Epstein's money was justified|last=Chen|first=Angela|website=MIT Technology Review|language=en-US|access-date=2019-09-15}}</ref>

==References==
{{reflist | 2}}

==External links==
{{wikiquote}}
{{Commons}}
* {{TED speaker}}
* {{YouTube|Q81TmwXe3ZM|TEDxBrussels: Nicholas Negroponte on OLPC}} (November 2009)
* {{C-SPAN|1706}}
** [http://www.c-span.org/video/?202050-1/qa-nicholas-negroponte C-SPAN ''Q&A'' interview with Negroponte, November 25, 2007]
* {{Charlie Rose view|755}}
* {{IMDb name|0624517}}
* {{NYT topic|people/n/nicholas_negroponte}}
* [http://www.netevents.tv/docuplayer.asp?docid=75 Nicholas Negroponte Keynote at NetEvents, Hong Kong inc. first production olpc laptop] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101104114640/http://www.netevents.tv/docuplayer.asp?docid=75 |date=November 4, 2010 }} December 2006
* [http://www.netevents.tv/docuplayer.asp?docid=100 Nicholas Negroponte Q&A at NetEvents, Hong Kong] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101104110531/http://www.netevents.tv/docuplayer.asp?docid=100 |date=November 4, 2010 }} December 2006
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20131208101855/http://www.necn.com/Boston/Arts-Entertainment/2009/10/21/Author-Nicholas-Negroponte-on/1256156542.html Nicholas Negroponte about books and OLPC on NECN]
* [http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2014/06/03/microsoft-and-intel-help-deliver-a-100-windows-81.aspx Microsoft and Intel help deliver a $100 Windows 8.1 tablet]
* [http://www.netevents.tv/docuplayer.asp?docid=75 Nicholas Negroponte Keynote at NetEvents, Hong Kong inc. first production olpc laptop] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101104114640/http://www.netevents.tv/docuplayer.asp?docid=75 |date=November 4, 2010 }} December 2006

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Negroponte, Nicholas}}
[[Category:1943 births]]
[[Category:Alumni of Institut Le Rosey]]
[[Category:American business theorists]]
[[Category:American computer scientists]]
[[Category:American technology writers]]
[[Category:American writers of Greek descent]]
[[Category:Greek Orthodox Christians from the United States]]
[[Category:Choate Rosemary Hall alumni]]
[[Category:Futurologists]]
[[Category:Greek academics]]
[[Category:Living people]]
[[Category:One Laptop per Child]]
[[Category:MIT School of Architecture and Planning alumni]]
[[Category:MIT Media Lab people]]
[[Category:People from the Upper East Side]]
[[Category:People from Wallingford, Connecticut]]
[[Category:Wired (magazine) people]]
[[Category:Fay School alumni]]
[[Category:Buckley School (New York City) alumni]]
[[Category:Architects from New York City]]