My goal is to document an aspect of Canadian history and culture that is overlooked. I'm fairly loose in my definition of Canadian. Some people or companies got their start in Canada, but were acquired or lured to the United States. Some innovations were done by Canadians while abroad. The point is not to debate citizenship, but rather to document innovations and their Canadian connections to demonstrate that Canada has made and continues to make a significant contribution to digital media and technology.
Update September 2011 - since writing this I've added over 30 more entries (and could add even more).
People
- Parham Aarabi, professor and inventor of imaging and internet advertising software
- Lorne Abony, e-Business (Petopia), gaming (FUN), and digital music business leader (Mood Media)
- Melody Adhami, co-founder of Plastic Mobile and leader in mobile app development
- Chris Albinson, venture capitalist, co-founder of C100, expat Canadian tech network
- Arcade Fire, music group - their online, interactive and personalized video for The Wilderness Downtown is awesome!
- Ronald Baecker, computer scientist and HCI researcher
- Jim Balsillie, co-founder of Research In Motion
- Michel Beaudet, creator of online humour videos Têtes à claques
- Gilles Brassard, co-inventor of the first quantum cryptography protocol, BB84
- Alexander Graham Bell, original telecom inventor
- Tim Bray, father of XML & co-founder of Open Text
- Rhiannon Bury, academic, studies women and online fandom
- Stewart Butterfield, co-founder of Flickr, pioneer in use of tagging
- Bill Buxton, principal researcher for Microsoft, pioneer in human computer interaction
- Garrett Camp, co-founder and CEO of StumbleUpon
- Ann Cavoukian, privacy czar, promotes greater privacy in social network sites and privacy by design
- David Cheriton, computer scientist, mentor & initial investor of Google - now billionaire
- Vincent Cheung, creator of image software Shape Collage
- Geof Collis, accessibility advocate and publisher of accessibility news
- Michael Cowpland, founder of Corel & tech eccentric
- William Craig, founder of iCraveTV, first company to stream television over Net
- Cassie Creighton, 5-year old co-creator with dad, Ryan Creigton, of a popular online game
- David Crow, organizer of tech events, DemoCamp and StartUpNorth
- Douglas Coupland, author of Generation X, Microserfs, JPod, etc.
- Ronald Deibert, researcher and campaigner against Internet censorship and cyber-espionage
- Peter Deutsch, leader of the team that invented Archie, the first Internet search engine
- John Demco, creator and first registrar of the .ca domain
- Hossein Derakhshan, influential Iranian blogger
- Sara Diamond, academic leader founding Banff's New Media Institute and Mobile Experience Innovation Centre
- Cory Doctorow, activist, blogger & co-editor of Boing Boing
- Markus Frind, founder of popular dating site Plenty of Fish
- Ganz Sam and Howard, founders of children's virtual wold, WebKinz, pioneered plush toy with virtual counterparts concept
- Michael Geist, prominent Internet law scholar
- William Gibson, author and visionary of cyberculture, coined term "cyberspace"
- Murray Goldberg, developer of WebCT one of the earliest and most popular e-learning platforms
- James Gosling, inventor of Java programming language
- Calvin Gotlieb, "father of computing in Canada"
- Kevin Ham, world leading domainer
- Caroline Haythornthwaite, researcher on social networking, online collaboration & communities
- Graham Hill, founder of environmental blog site, TreeHugger
- Cory Horner, early DIY programmer, leader in government transparency, launched How'dTheyVote.ca in 2005
- Tara Hunt, online marketing and communities expert
- Glenda Hyatt, accessibility advocate and blogger
- Mathew Ingram, tech journalist and co-founder of mesh conference
- Donna Jodhan, campaigner for web accessibility, launched the first federal court case demanding greater accessibility of government websites
- Brian Kernighan, computer scientist, creator of "Hello, world" program, popular for training programmers (the first code I wrote)
- Justin Kozuch, lead researcher of the 49 Pixels project, a study of Canada's digital economy
- Deidre LaCarte, creator of Hampster Dance, believed to be first Internet meme
- Lake Minnewanka Squirrel, Internet meme of scene-stealing rodent
- Mike Lazaridis, founder of Research in Motion
- Rasmus Lerdorf, creator of PHP and open source advocate
- Pierre Lévy, academic, developed notions of collective intelligence
- Bruce Livingstone, founder of leading stock photo service, iStockPhotos
- mafiaboy, prominent website hacker
- Amber MacArthur, tech journalist and podcaster
- Marc MacKenzie, winner of most beautiful Twitter message
- Don Mattrick, founder of Distinctive Software (predecessor of EA Canada) at 17, now Microsoft SVP of gaming
- Marshall McLuhan, communications theorist and tech visionary
- Sid Meier, game developer of the Civilization series, second inductee into the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences' Hall of Fame
- Lane Merrifield, co-founder of Club Penguin and developer of children's virtual worlds
- Michael Mulley, DIY developer of government transparency website, openparliament.ca
- Ryan North, writer and creator of online comic Dinosaur Comics
- David Ossip, founder of Workbrain, efficiency software
- Emma Payne, author and founder of Wired Women
- Rob Pike, co-creator of UTF-8, a unicode standard
- Kate Pullinger and Chris Joseph, pioneers in transmedia storytelling, incl. Interactive Alice
- Simon Pulsifer, prominent and prolific Wikipedia contributor
- Jade Raymond, gaming executive for Ubisoft
- Andrew Rivkin and Mark Rivkin, founders of online gambling tech company, Cryptologic
- Ray Muzyka & Greg Zeschuk, co-founders of role-playing gaming company BioWare, 2011 inductees Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences' Hall of Fame
- Mark Rzepka, pioneer of online pharmacies
- Robert J. Sawyer, scifi author, including his recent WWW trilogy
- Gerri Sinclair, founder of Canada's first multimedia research centre
- Jay Steele, founder of Viigo, a news aggregator app for Blackberry
- Jeffrey Skoll, co-founder of eBay
- Star Wars Kid, another Internet meme star
- Jennifer Stoddart, privacy czar
- Don Tapscott, tech culture visionary and author of Wikinomics
- Clive Thompson, journalist has written for Shift and Wired
- Ilse Treurnicht, CEO of tech incubator and innovation centre, MaRS
- Jutta Treviranus, researcher on web accessibility, lead author of authoring tool accessibility guidelines
- Steven Turnbull, Facebook Scrabble champ
- Barry Wellman, academic, pioneer in studies of online communities & social networking
- Beatrice Helen Worsley, computer pioneer - possibly the first woman to earn a PhD in computers and her dissertation was first on modern computers
- Tim Wu - Internet governance and policy scholar, coined term "network neutrality"
- Michel Vulpe, inventor and founder of i4i, successfully sued Microsoft for patent infringement
- Bob Young, founder of micropublisher, Lulu and former CEO of Red Hat
Companies or Projects
- AbeBooks - once the largest used books e-tailer
- Archie - first Internet search engine
- b5media - blog aggregator
- BiblioCommons - online library catalog enhancements
- BioWare - gaming (acquired by EA)
- Black Box Games - gaming (acquired by EA)
- Bump Technologies - 3D desktop visualization (acquired by Google)
- Cambrian House - crowdsourcing
- Canarie - research network
- Concept Share - collaboration software for design professionals
- Chilly Beach - online cartoons
- Club Penguin - children's virtual world (acquired by Disney)
- Corel - office and imaging software
- CryptoLogic - gambling software
- Desire2Learn - learning based software
- Discover Anywhere Mobile - location based services software
- Distinctive Software - gaming (acquired by EA)
- Digital Cement - marketing agency (acquired)
- ePresence - webcasting software (acquired)
- Extreme Venture Partners - venture capital for tech start-ups
- 500 pixels - online photo portfolio
- Flickr - photo sharing website (acquired by Yahoo)
- Fresh Books - online personal accounting software
- eHarlequin - online storytelling and community
- Geotoko - mobile marketing
- GigPark
- gShift Labs - search engine optimization
- gsmprjct technologie - interactive technologies
- Guardly mobile personal security app
- Guestlist - event management
- HootSuite - social media monitoring
- Ice.com - early e-tailer
- Idée - visual search engine
- InGamer Sports - live event social gaming
- iStockPhoto - stock photos
- J2Play - developed world’s first mobile multiplayer game (acquired by EA)
- Justwhiteshirts - early e-tailer
- Kik Interactive - texting software
- Iceberg Radio - Internet radio
- Lavalife - online dating
- LiveHive Systems
- Long Pen - event software and robotics
- MaRS - tech incubator
- MegaDox - online legal forms and document templates
- mTrip - mobile travel guides
- MyVoice - communication aid
- Naked News - online porn
- Netsweeper - content filtering software
- Nortel - telecom tech
- NowPublic - citizen journalism
- Octopz - online collaboration
- OpenFile - user-generated online newspaper
- Open Text - early web directory, content management software
- Plastic Mobile - mobile app agency
- PlentyofFish - online dating
- Polar Mobile - mobile apps agency
- PostRank - social engagement and influence ratings, incl. Aide RSS
- Pretzil - check-in aggregator
- Quillsoft - literacy and speech recognition software
- Radian6 - social media monitoring
- Reseach In Motion - mobile devices
- Shopify - e-commerce solutions
- Simply Audio Books - leading audio book e-tailer
- Syncapse - social media management
- Sysomos - social media monitoring
- StumbleUpon - website social discovery
- TakingITGlobal - organizer of IT volunteers
- Task Avenue - location-based task reminders
- Tech Vibes - tech news
- A Thinking Ape - mobile agency
- 20-20 Technologies - interior design software
- Tucows - ISP and application
- UFile - tax-filing software
- Viafoura - online user engagement
- WebCT - early e-learning platform (acquired by Blackboard)
- WebKinz - children's virtual world & game by Ganz
- Weblo - virtual world
- Wild Apricot - software for non-profits
- Workbrain - business efficency software (acquired)
- Xtreme Labs - mobile agency
- Zerofootprint - environment software
I know I missed entries. My inclusion criteria is completely subjective and I have an Internet bias, but every year this list grows so hopefully it'll become increasingly definitive and encompass more elements of the digital sphere.
I'm particularly keen on capturing individuals and companies with a historic or international influence. Please help me out by letting me know of any additions.
July 14, 2011 Update: Thanks to the expertise of Sara Grimes, I was able to add a bunch of entries on Canadian gaming luminaries that was previously lacking.
10 comments:
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Piccsy is Canadian, I think. Sort of like a vimeo for flikr, I think. www.piccsy.com
Thanks for putting this together.
I'm happy to say we've had a hand in shaping the design of three of those companies/projects and count a number of the people listed as friends.
While certainly not exhaustive, the list is a great snapshot of a rich community. Another list worth putting together is a list of Canadians working abroad. I haven't seen anything that shows how we're infiltrating the tech space abroad, but I think San Francisco is about 15% Canadian.
Perhaps it's time for a Web focused update to the Canadian Conspiracy doc: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0285470/combined
And, you can see a lot more Canadian startups here, though it looks like the content won't be fresh for much longer:
http://startupindex.ca
Hey there! Thanks for including me on the list (honored!), though I shudder at the title of 'social media guru'. I'm actually CEO and Co-Founder of Canadian startup, Buyosphere.com, and though I'm widely known for my work on the social web over the years (book and speaking), I've tried to distance myself from the social media movement since day 1. Still...I shouldn't look a gift list in the mouth, right? ;)
Hi Tara:
Thanks for commenting on my blog (first person from the list to do so). I have to say that making this list was significantly more work than I ever wanted it to be. Truthfully, I don't have the time to do it full justice. Also trying to reduce someone's lifework to a few words is rather ludicrous in itself.
I do think it is important that aspect of Canada's history and culture be documented and shared.
I can't believe, however, that I used the trite terms "guru" and "czar" (almost as bad as "maven"). I adjusted the description to get rid of the offending term (but I just couldn't bring myself to get rid of "privacy czar" yet).
Hi Lee:
I love the film Canadian Conspiracy. Canadian talent has a long history of emigrating south.
I probably have too many start-ups on my list - unless they have introduced something completely new, have an impressive market share, or sold for an incredible sum of money (as Club Penguin did) they haven't necessarily distinguished themselves to the level of say Bell. (Not that I have the guts to launch a start-up, an incredible accomplishment in itself!)
Glen, great list! A few companies and people I didn't even realize were Canadian.
One to add would be www.TrendHunter.com and its founder JeremyGutsche.com. Based in Toronto, Trend Hunter is the world's largest trend community with over 35 million monthly views, 110k+ trends, and over 1 million Facebook fans.
Jeremy recently won BDC Young Entrepreneur of the year for Ontario and Trend Hunter was recognized as a finalist last year by the CIX as one of Canada's top digital media companies
Bioware- Canadian game developer.
Greg Zeschuk and Ray Muzyka - principals
-Trent
Great list!
Agility CMS, a cloud-based software for managing internally produced and user generated content across web, mobile and social media. system located in Toronto. www.agilitycms.com
Co-founders:
Michael Assad, CEO http://ca.linkedin.com/in/michaelassad
Jonathan Voigt, CTO http://ca.linkedin.com/in/jonvoigt
They're EO members as well.
Hi Glen, this is a great list! Thanks for putting it together. Another person to consider for your list is David Laclaren, President and CEO of VRX Studios and latest venture MediaValet - the first 100% Cloud-based Digital Asset Management system.
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