John Perry Barlow

About John Perry

• Studied comparative religion at Wesleyan University, then spent two years wandering around India.
• After college, he spent time living on his family's ranch and writing songs for the Grateful Dead.
• Was always fascinated by what would replace the solitary ranch lifestyle that was dying out.
• In the '80s, someone told him to check out a Grateful Dead message board; this was his first encounter with the Internet, still in its early stages.
• He realized the Internet was going to become "the nervous system" of the collective human race, it became one of his interests.
• Harper's Bazaar started a forum discussing the issues of personal privacy and freedom of expression in the age of the Web.
• In 1990, he took those ideas and started EFF, which protects free speech online, limits government access to personal data.
• Stresses that everyone feels confused about what they want to do with their lives; you can take comfort in knowing your colleagues are just as scared as you are.