Conrad Berners Lee

The story I was told in 1999 goes like this.

My friend, who works at a high level in Internet strategy and management in the UK, was giving a presentation in the late 90s to a favorite charity that he supported, on how he proposed they should use the Web. Various trustees were there and at the end one of the older ones approached Andrew, thanked him for his presentation and said casually: "You might know my son, who works on the World Wide Web. His name is Tim." Inwardly Andrew groaned, he told me - another bit twiddler no doubt. But he humoured the old man.

"Er, Tim who?"

"TimBernersLee." (though it is not certain he used the WikiName, to be absolutely fair)

"Sir, your son doesn't just work on the Web ... he invented the whole darn thing!"

The very cool, very English thing (in the best sense) was that even after hearing Andrew's accolades, the father's attitude, quite genuinely was: he's simply doing his best. He's not that special.

How I loved that.

I wonder why it took me so long to tell it on Wiki, given my interest in SecondGenerationProgrammer. -- RichardDrake