Marc Andreessen, innovator and visionary, was born in Cedar Falls, Iowa on July 9, 1971. As a child he was fascinated by technology and taught himself basic programing at the age of nine. This curiosity lead him to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC), where he majored in Computer Science. While at UIUC the young entrepreneur became intrigued by the recent development of the World Wide Web and the sharing of information.
While an undergraduate, Andreessen and Eric Bina worked at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) to develop a user friendly search browser with graphics that would work on a variety of computers. Their end result was the Mosaic web browser. Upon graduation from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Anderson partnered with James Clark, to launch Netscape in 1995. In 1999 AOL purchased Netscape and Anderson briefly served as chief technical officer at AOL. He would later go onto found Loud-Cloud, then CTO of Ning.
Netscape Navigator was the first true Internet browser and allowed the world to easily use the Internet. Ultimately, Microsoft bought a license for Mosaic from The University of Illinois and subsequently launched Microsoft Explorer.
If you want to know more you will find a list of sources below.
Archival Records:
- NCTE/Middle Level Section File (record series 15/72/4): contains minutes and agendas showcasing Mosaic at the NCTE annual convention (1997), box 1 (At ARC) - NCSA Clippings File (record series 7/5/10): contains news clippings on Marc
- Andreessen (At ARC) - Alumni and Faculty Biographical/Morgue File (record series 26/4/1) on Andreessen
- Stanley Inkberry General Correspondence File (record series 2/14/1): contains
correspondence on Mosaic in box 324
- Original Mosaic program files (on NCSA site): ftp.ncsa.uiuc.edu/Mosaic/
Work Cited:
Marc Andreessen. (2015). The Biography.com website. Retrieved 03:15, Feb 08, 2015, from http://www.biography.com/people/marc-andreessen-9542208.
Marc Andreessen. Retrieved February 8, 2015, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marc_Andreessen
Image of Marc Andreessen
https://ws.engr.illinois.edu/blogs/viewphoto.aspx?id=8494
