Computer Freaks

Inc. Magazine

The Battles and Betrayals of the Internet's Founding Fathers

  • 46 minutes 29 seconds
    Season 2, Episode 6: Briefly Famous

    This episode looks back at where all of our main characters landed in their lives after the tech boom and bust and what they have learned.

    17 April 2025, 9:00 am
  • 55 minutes 54 seconds
    Season 2, Episode 5: Crazy Bill

    Goto.com rises to the highest levels of success and even tries to buy Google. But this episode looks at what went wrong.

    10 April 2025, 9:00 am
  • 36 minutes 52 seconds
    Season 2, Episode 4: Permissionless Innovation

    In this episode, we pivot to Pasadena where the world of e-commerce is taking off to broader audiences. Through our e-commerce characters, we meet Bill Gross who is digging into the radically changing world of paid search

    3 April 2025, 9:00 am
  • 44 minutes 17 seconds
    Season 2, Chapter 3: Bad Blood

    This episode explores a new protocol war between EIT and Netscape over security. 

    27 March 2025, 9:00 am
  • 48 minutes 2 seconds
    Season 2, Chapter 2: Marc the Shark

    This is the origin story of when Marc Andreessen first arrives in Silicon Valley. This episode paints a picture of the world he arrives in, who he befriends and who he alienates.

    20 March 2025, 4:00 am
  • 44 minutes 55 seconds
    Season 2, Chapter 1: Illegal, Immoral and Fattening

    Episode One introduces our listeners to the next generation of Computer Freaks who are getting into new technologies like the world wide web and e-commerce - just as these fields are opening up to the masses.

    13 March 2025, 9:00 am
  • 2 minutes 49 seconds
    Computer Freaks is back for a second season!

    On the heels of Season One of Computer Freaks, Season Two pivots to the dawn of internet entrepreneurship and its broader and irrevocable impact on our culture in the 1990s. Featuring extensive interviews with internet pioneers from companies like Google, Overture, Netscape and more. New episodes are available every Thursday on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. 

    27 February 2025, 10:00 am
  • 36 minutes 47 seconds
    Chapter Six: Unintended Consequences

    We return to speaking to Joseph Haughney about his hopes for the Arpanet. We ask other founders how they feel about what the internet has become. We also speak to internet early founder Hans Werner Braun’s daughters about how they reconcile themselves the world their father helped create.

    20 July 2023, 7:00 am
  • 42 minutes 26 seconds
    Chapter Five: The Protocol Wars

    It is the late 1970s and early 1980s and the Arpanet is in decline. NSFnet is on the rise in its place. Why did the Arpanet get eclipsed by other networks, and is that OK?

    13 July 2023, 7:00 am
  • 41 minutes 35 seconds
    Chapter Four: The French Connection

    Louis Pouzin is a French academic who some experts say really invented the Arpanet. But is that true, and should any one person be given all the credit?

    6 July 2023, 7:00 am
  • 36 minutes 58 seconds
    Chapter Three: Let's Have a Ball

    It’s the 1970s and both the government and academia are doing everything they can to spread the word of the Arpanet. But as the Arpanet gains popularity everywhere after its 1972 coming-out ball in Washington, D.C., through its new phone book, it also faces detractors who don’t want it to be available to all.

    29 June 2023, 8:00 am
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