As part of its continuing campaign to sign up the biggest guns in Internet development, Google says it has hired Vinton ‘Vint’ Cerf who is widely credited as the Father of the Internet. It was Cerf’s work in designing the TCP/IP protocols that laid the foundations of the Internet.
His vision for technology helped create entire industries that have transformed many parts of our lives. We are honored to welcome him to Google.
As a result, the 62-year-old co-developer of the TCP/IP protocol that made it possible for computers to interact on the Internet said he was drawn to the work at search-engine giant Google Inc., Cerf is scheduled to start work Oct. 3.
In an interview with AFP, Cerf said the job of ‘evangelist’ would include a combination of strategy, technology and general enthusiast for Google, to help use the company as a platform for new ways to use the internet.
I hope to be a sounding board as well as an enthusiast for what Google is doing, he said. This is a place that is just full of creative energy, and I like places like that, Cerf said.
Google is not only looking to help organize the massive amounts of digitized information getting connected to the Internet, but it is also extending its footprint to devices connected to the web, Cerf said. As an example, he pointed to the Mountain View, Calif., company’s desktop-search application, which also connects the user to its Internet services.
Google has already made tremendous strides in making access to information on the web a reality for users across the globe, but we are still in the internet’s early innings, he said.
This medium will enjoy wider-spread use than television, radio or phones, and will ultimately expand beyond planet Earth. Google has always believed in doing things differently, and I believe that places us in a unique position to help bring even the wildest internet visions into reality."
He will continue as chairperson of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, or Icann, a nonprofit organization that manages the internet address system. Cerf will help Google build network infrastructure, architectures, systems and standards for the next generation of Internet applications, the company said in a statement.
In addition to his new position with Google, Cerf is also working on the Interplanetary Network, a project of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab that aims to extend the internet into outer space for planet-to-planet communications, according to the statement by Google.
Cerf has a mathematics degree from Stanford University and master’s and doctorate degrees in computer science from the University of California at Los Angeles.
During his tenure from 1976-1982 with the US Department of Defense’s Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), Cerf played a key role leading the development of internet and internet-related data packet and security technologies, according to his official biography.
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