Swiss born Esther Dyson is a self-described authority on emerging digital technology and considered a founding member of the digerati. A member of the US National Information Infrastructure Advisory Council and a director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, she is active in industry affairs. She also co-chairs the NII AC’s Information Privacy and Intellectual Property sub-committee and runs the EFF’s Information Privacy sub-committee. She sits on the board of the Global Business Network and the WPP Group.

After graduating from Harvard in economics, she joined Forbes as a fact-checker and quickly rose to reporter. In 1977, she joined New Court Securities as “the research department,” following Federal Express and other start-ups. After a stint at Oppenheimer covering software companies, she moved to Rosen Research and in 1983 bought the company from her employer Ben Rosen, renaming it EDventure Holdings. She sold EDventure Holdings to CNET Networks in 2004 and left CNET in January 2007.