Mitch Altman
Mitch Altman is a San Francisco-based hacker and inventor, best known for co-founding 3ware (with J. Peter Herz and Jim MacDonald), his pioneering in Virtual Reality at VPL Research and inventing TV-B-Gone. He is also President and CTO of Cornfield Electronics.
Early life and education
Altman grew up in Rogers Park, Chicago, Illinois. After kindergarten his familiy moved to Highland Park, Illinois. Altman graduated from Deerfield High School (Illinois) in 1975. Altman is an alumni of the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign, where he gained an undergraduate degree(1980) and a master's degree(1984) in electrical engineering. While at the University of Illinois, Altman co-founded Hash Wednesday. Altman moved to the San Francisco Bay Area in 1986 to work in Silicon Valley.
Virtual Reality
Altman is widely regarded as a pioneer of Virtual Reality. He worked at VPL Research with Jaron Lanier Altman left VPL Research when it started getting military contracts.
3ware
Altman co-founded Silicon Valley start-up 3ware in February 1997 with J. Peter Herz and Jim MacDonald (who is on the advisory board of Cornfield Electronics).
Cornfield Electronics
Altman started Cornfield Electronics as a consultancy company. After the launch of TV-B-Gone Altman gave the company the tagline "Useful Electronics for a Better World".
TV-B-Gone
In 2004 Altman released a one-button universal remote control called TV-B-Gone, to be used for turning off TVs in public places. According to Altman, "TV has become a worldwide epidemic and sadly, a way of life for some people". In an interview with the BBC, he stated "I don't want to make anyone's life more difficult. I just don't like TV, and I'd like people to think more about this powerful medium in their lives." Altman used money from the sale of 3ware to pay for the manufacture of the first 20,000 units of TV-B-Gone.
External Links
Audio of a talk given by Altman and Lady Ada on July 23, 2006 at HOPE Number Six
TV-B-Gone at Cornfield Electronics, Inc.
Ward 49 of the City of Chicago includes most of Rogers Park and parts of West Ridge.
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