Richard (Rick) Adams is the founder of UUNET and the founder of Internet Systems Consortium. [1]

Country: USA
Website:

   http://rickadams.org/weblog/

Facebook:    Rick Adams

Professional Achievements

Rick Adams helped make the Internet widely accessible by implementing the first Serial Line IP (SLIP), and founding UUNET Communication Services, which became the world's largest Internet Service Provider in the 1990s. In 1982 he was the first individual to send an e-mail link to a machine at the Center for Seismic Studies in Northern Virginia. He was also in charge of B News, the most popular Usenet News transport from that time. [2] Mr. Adams foundedInternet Systems Consortium, Inc. with other two professionals: Carl Malamud and Paul Vixie, using funding obtained from UUNET activity.

History

Adams founded UUNET Communications Service as a nonprofit telecommunications company with the main purpose to reduce the cost of mail and Usenet traffic sent by UUCP, especially for rural America. UUNET quickly became the official gateway between North America and Europe and the connection between UUCP mail and Internet email. [3]

UUNET Technology, the first ISP in the US, was founded by Adams. The company was built by acquiring assets from UUNET Communication services, and thus the latter received a share of the profits. UUNET Technology became a successful company and was sold in 1995 to MFS (Metropolitan Fiber Systems), though in 1996 it was acquired by Worldcom.[4]

Rick left UUNET in 1994 and the company was taken over by John Sidgmore. After UUNET, Rick became a partner in other businesses, such as a restaurant in Virginia. He notably made a donation in 1996, of one million US dollars, to the James Randi Educational Foundation, which was to be used for the paranormal Million Dollar Challenge.

Rick Adams and ICANN

Among other notable collaborations, ISC and ICANN also collaborated on the DNS "F" root server, which was the first one to be distributed using anycast.[5]

Education

Rick Adams holds a Master's degree in computer science from Purdue University. [6]

References