INVENTOR

Ray Tomlinson

1941 - 2016

Ray Tomlinson

Raymond Samuel Tomlinson (April 23, 1941 – March 5, 2016) was a pioneering American computer programmer who implemented the first email program on the ARPANET system, the precursor to the Internet, in 1971; he is internationally known and credited as the inventor of email. It was the first system able to send mail between users on different hosts connected to ARPANET. Previously, mail could be sent only to others who used the same computer. To achieve this, he used the @ sign to separate the user name from the name of their machine, a scheme which has been used in email addresses ever since. Read more on Wikipedia

Since 2007, the English Wikipedia page of Ray Tomlinson has received more than 658,495 page views. His biography is available in 45 different languages on Wikipedia making him the 75th most popular inventor.

Memorability Metrics

  • 660k

    Page Views (PV)

  • 62.31

    Historical Popularity Index (HPI)

  • 45

    Languages Editions (L)

  • 8.77

    Effective Languages (L*)

  • 3.06

    Coefficient of Variation (CV)

Page views of Ray Tomlinsons by language


Among INVENTORS

Among inventors, Ray Tomlinson ranks 75 out of 323. Before him are Thomas Savery, Oleg Antonov, Percy Spencer, Paul Gottlieb Nipkow, Jacques de Vaucanson, and Charles K. Kao. After him are John Harrison, Alois Senefelder, Jacques Piccard, Vladimir K. Zworykin, Cornelis Drebbel, and Leo Fender.

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Contemporaries

Among people born in 1941, Ray Tomlinson ranks 46. Before him are Wolfgang Petersen, Ivan Gašparovič, Abdelkader Bensalah, Chick Corea, Anne Rice, and Ali Hassan al-Majid. After him are Ivica Osim, Jules A. Hoffmann, Frank Farian, Roberto Carlos, Art Garfunkel, and Toyo Ito. Among people deceased in 2016, Ray Tomlinson ranks 43. Before him are Bernardo Provenzano, Andrzej Żuławski, Michael Cimino, Gene Wilder, Carlo Azeglio Ciampi, and Hilary Putnam. After him are Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Reinhard Selten, Robert Vaughn, Věra Čáslavská, Jacques Rivette, and Ettore Scola.

Others Born in 1941

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Others Deceased in 2016

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In United States

Among people born in United States, Ray Tomlinson ranks 789 out of 12,171. Before him are Jean Harlow (1911), Jerry Lee Lewis (1935), Luke Perry (1966), Herbert Spencer Gasser (1888), H. H. Holmes (1861), and Boris Johnson (1964). After him are Burgess Meredith (1907), Paul Greengard (1925), Kenneth Arrow (1921), Priscilla Presley (1945), David Hasselhoff (1952), and Ronald Wayne (1934).

Others born in United States

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Among INVENTORS In United States

Among inventors born in United States, Ray Tomlinson ranks 21. Before him are Les Paul (1915), George Eastman (1854), John Browning (1855), Jimmy Wales (1966), John Deere (1804), and Percy Spencer (1894). After him are Leo Fender (1909), Jacque Fresco (1916), Bob Kahn (1938), Robert Noyce (1927), Elisha Otis (1811), and Elisha Gray (1835).

Inventors Born in United States

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