• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to footer
Ihof Logo Header 182px 67px

Internet Hall of Fame

Recognizing the People Who Bring the Internet to Life

Search DropdownSearch IconNominate
  • About
    • Advisory Board
    • Previous Events
  • Inductees
  • News
    • Blog
    • Announcements
  • Nominate
Home / Inductees in the News / Celebrating the Contributions of Robert Taylor
19 May 2017

Celebrating the Contributions of Robert Taylor

The tech community is mourning the loss of a pioneer who, despite leaving his fingerprints everywhere, is rarely mentioned in the history books. 

Robert Taylor died last month at his home in Woodside, California, last month at age 85 due to complications from Parkinson’s Disease. 

Taylor’s impact dates back to 1961, when, as a young project manager at NASA, he decided to direct funding towards a project that spawned the computer mouse. Five years later, he convinced his supervisor at what is now DARPA to invest $500,000 of taxpayer dollars to build Arpanet, or the precursor to the modern internet. 

 While at Xerox PARC in the 1970s and early 1980s, Taylor led a lab team that developed or perfected several innovations associated with modern computing, including icons, pop-up menus, overlapping windows and bitmap displays.  

Towards the end of his career, Taylor created and ran the Digital Equipment Systems Research Laboratory in Palo Alto, California, which helped create AltaVista, one of the early modern search engines. 

In an obituary published by Wired, Leslie Berlin referenced the last email Taylor sent out, which reveled in the “ringside seat” he held as his teams dreamed up new ways to push the boundaries of technology. 

“You did what they said could not be done, you created things that they could not see or imagine.” – Robert Taylor 

Related Posts

13 January 2017

Ida Holz: The Uruguayan of the Internet

Read More about Ida Holz: The Uruguayan of the Internet

29 March 2017

Tim Berners-Lee: Three Things We Need to Do to Save the Web

Read More about Tim Berners-Lee: Three Things We Need to Do to Save the Web

14 November 2017

The Worst Internet in America

Read More about The Worst Internet in America

21 June 2017

A Search for the Zombie Websites of 1995

Read More about A Search for the Zombie Websites of 1995

Footer

Facebook F 1
Twitter 1
Youtube 1
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of Use
  • Contact Us

The Internet Hall of Fame is presented by:

Internet Society 76x25

USA

11710 Plaza America Drive
Suite 400
Reston, VA 20190
+1-703-439-2120

Switzerland

Rue Vallin 2
CH-1201 Geneva
+41-22-807-1444

Other Offices

© 2023 Internet Society