Jaan Tallinn

Jaan Tallinn (born 14 February 1972) is an Estonian computer programmer and investor[2] known for his participation in the development of Skype[3] in 2002 and FastTrack/Kazaa, a file-sharing application, in 2000.[4]

Jaan Tallinn
Born (1972-02-14) 14 February 1972[1]
Tallinn, Estonia
EducationBSc in Theoretical Physics
Alma materUniversity of Tartu
Occupationprogrammer, investor
Known forKazaa
Skype
Existential risk

Jaan Tallinn is partner and co-founder of the development company Bluemoon which created the game SkyRoads.[5]

Life

Jaan Tallinn graduated from the University of Tartu in 1996 with a BSc in Theoretical Physics with a thesis that considered travelling interstellar distances using warps in space-time.

Tallinn founded Bluemoon in Estonia alongside schoolmates Ahti Heinla and Priit Kasesalu. Bluemoon's Kosmonaut became, in 1989 (SkyRoads is the 1993 remake), the first Estonian game to be sold abroad, and earned the company 5,000 USD. By 1999, Bluemoon faced bankruptcy; its founders decided to acquire remote jobs for the Swedish Tele2 at a salary of 330 USD each per day. The Tele2 project, "Everyday.com", was a commercial flop. Subsequently, while working as a stay-at-home dad, Tallinn developed FastTrack and Kazaa for Niklas Zennström and Janus Friis (formerly of Tele2). Kazaa's P2P technology was later repurposed to drive Skype around 2003. Tallinn sold his shares in Skype in 2005, when it was purchased by eBay.[6][7]

In 2014, he invested in the reversible debugging software for app development Undo Software.[8] He also made an early investment in DeepMind which was purchased by Google in 2014 for $600 million.[9] Other investments include Faculty, a British AI startup focused on tracking terrorists,[10] and Pactum, an "autonomous negotiation" startup based in California and Estonia.[11]

Other tenures

Tallinn participates in the effective altruism movement and donated $604,500 to the effective altruism associated Machine Intelligence Research Institute since 2015.[20][21][22] In addition, his initial donation, in 2012, when co-founding the Centre for the Study of Existential Risk was around $200,000.[7]

Views

Tallinn strongly promotes the study of existential risk and has given numerous talks on this topic.[23] His main worries are related to artificial intelligence, unknowns coming from technological development, and biological risk.[24][25] He believes humanity is not spending enough resources on long-term planning and mitigating threats that could wipe us out as a species.[26]

References
  1. "Jaan Tallinn, Curriculum Vitae". Tartu Ülikool Sihtasutus. May 2012. Archived from the original on 6 December 2013. Retrieved 6 September 2013.
  2. "Jaan Tallinn at Ambient Sound Investments". University of Cambridge. Retrieved 30 October 2016.
  3. "Creating global business model for knowledge-intensive SMES the small transition country cases" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2012-02-18. Retrieved 2009-07-24.
  4. "Tech firms find home in revived Estonia". International Herald Tribune. 13 December 2005. Retrieved 2009-09-18.
  5. "If It Works, You Can Break It". Forbes. 20 December 2004. Retrieved 2009-09-18.
  6. ""How can they be so good?": The strange story of Skype". Ars Technica. 3 September 2018. Retrieved 29 March 2019.
  7. Hvistendahl, Mara (28 March 2019). "Can we stop AI outsmarting humanity?". The Guardian. Retrieved 29 March 2019.
  8. "Skype Co-Founder Jaan Tallinn Backs Reversible Debugging Startup Undo Software". TechCrunch. Retrieved 2019-09-10.
  9. Shead, Sam. "The Skype Mafia: Who Are They And Where Are They Now?". Forbes. Retrieved 2019-09-10.
  10. Field, Matthew; Boland, Hannah (29 November 2019). "Guardian venture arm invests millions in terrorist tracking AI start-up". The Telegraph. Retrieved 31 March 2020.
  11. Williams, Joe (2020). "Walmart is about to let machines negotiate contracts with some suppliers, and it's a glimpse into the future of supply chains in a post-coronavirus world". Business Insider. Retrieved 31 March 2020.
  12. "Office of the President press announcement". Archived from the original on 2011-05-14.
  13. Lewsey, Fred (25 November 2012). "Humanity's last invention and our uncertain future". Research News. University of Cambridge. Retrieved 28 January 2013.
  14. "Future of Life Institute".
  15. "Elon Musk Donates $10M To Make Sure AI Doesn't Go The Way Of Skynet". Mashable. 2015. Retrieved 21 Jun 2015.
  16. "Elon Musk spends $10 million to stop robot uprising (+video)". Christian Science Monitor. 2015. Retrieved 21 Jun 2015.
  17. "Elon Musk: Future of Life Institute Artificial Intelligence Research Could be Crucial". Bostinno. Retrieved 5 Jun 2015.
  18. Weber, Harrison (1 March 2013). "Peter Thiel-backed MetaMed thinks you should have your own on-demand medical research team". TheNextWeb. Retrieved 4 April 2013.
  19. Clarke, Liat (24 April 2015). "The solution to saving healthcare systems? New feedback loops". Wired.co.uk. Retrieved 24 May 2015. Tallinn learned the importance of feedback loops himself the hard way, after seeing the demise of one of his startups, medical consulting firm Metamed.
  20. "Machine Intelligence Research Institute".
  21. "Jaan Tallinn - Effective Altruism". Effective Altruism. Retrieved 2017-07-03.
  22. "Skype inventor Jaan Tallinn wants to use Bitcoin technology to save the world". The Telegraph. Retrieved 2017-07-03.
  23. "Jaan Tallinn on the Intelligence Stairway".
  24. "A Skype founder on biomonitors, existential risk and simulated realities". The Wall Street Journal. 31 May 2013. Retrieved 2014-05-02.
  25. "Existential Risk: A Conversation with Jaan Tallinn". Edge Foundation, Inc. 16 April 2015.
  26. "Skype co-founder Jaan Tallinn on surviving the rise of the machines". Marketplace. 26 December 2012. Retrieved 2014-05-02.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.