Tim O'Reilly

O’Reilly graduated cum laude from Harvard UniversityHarvard UniversityHarvard University is a private research university in Massachusetts, established by the Massachusetts Bay Colony legislature in 1636 and named in 1639 for early benefactor John Harvard. Its principal campuses are in Cambridge and the Allston and Longwood neighborhoods of Boston. It includes Harvard College, graduate and professional schools, and the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. Two governing boards share oversight. Alan M. Garber was president as of October 2026, and the endowment stood at $56.9 billion at the end of fiscal 2025.Open the full entry in 1975 with a B.A. in classics; his honors thesis explored the tension between mysticism and logic in PlatoPlatoPlato develops simulated work environments for training and evaluating AI agents. It builds working environments around the software, data and workflows of real jobs and publishes benchmarks for assessing model capabilities.Open the full entry’s dialogues.⁠[1]

The company O’Reilly founded began as a technical writing consulting firm and started publishing books on programming and computer technology in 1984; it is headquartered in Sebastopol, California. His original business plan for the company was “interesting work for interesting people.”⁠[2][3]

In 1992 the company published Ed Krol’s The Whole Internet User’s Guide & Catalog, an early popular book about the internet. In 1993 it launched the Global Network Navigator (GNN), which the company describes as the first web portal and the first true commercial site on the World Wide Web; in 1994 it funded “Geek of the Week” on Internet Talk Radio.⁠[3][2]

In September 1995 O’Reilly sold GNN to America OnlineAOLAOL is an American internet brand offering a news portal, email, and membership services. Its history dates to an online-services company founded in 1985.Open the full entry (AOL).⁠[1][2]

The company launched The Perl Conference in 1997. In 1998 O’Reilly hosted a meeting of free software leaders at which the term “Open Source Software” was formally adopted; the gathering became known as the Open Source Summit.⁠[2][3]

In 1999 O’Reilly received InfoWorldInfoWorldInfoWorld is a technology publication originating in 1978, serving enterprise developers, software architects and technology decision-makers as part of Foundry.Open the full entry’s Industry Achievement Award for his open source advocacy; that year O’Reilly Ventures invested in Pyra Labs, the creator of Blogger.⁠[3]

In 2000 O’Reilly’s “Open Letter to Jeff BezosJeff BezosJeff Bezos is an American entrepreneur and investor who founded Amazon in 1994, led it as chief executive for many years, and became its executive chair in 2021. He also founded the spaceflight company Blue Origin, bought The Washington Post in 2013, and set up philanthropic funds including the Bezos Earth Fund.Open the full entry” over AmazonAmazonAmazon is a publicly traded U.S. technology and retail company founded by Jeff Bezos in 1994, with its principal corporate offices in Seattle. Its businesses span e-commerce, logistics and fulfillment, digital advertising, membership and entertainment services, consumer electronics, and Amazon Web Services cloud computing.Open the full entry’s 1-Click patent gathered 10,000 signatures in four days. In 2001 the company launched Safari Books Online with Pearson Technology Group.⁠[3]

In 2003 the first Foo Camp was held in Sebastopol, California; that year O’Reilly and Mark Jacobsen helped Evan Williams negotiate the sale of Blogger to GoogleGoogleGoogle is an American technology company founded by Larry Page and Sergey Brin and incorporated in 1998. It became an Alphabet subsidiary in 2015. Its businesses include internet search, advertising, software platforms, cloud computing, and artificial intelligence.Open the full entry.⁠[3]

The phrase “Web 2.0” was coined by the company’s Dale Dougherty in 2003, and the first Web 2.0 Conference introduced the concept in 2004. That year O’Reilly & Associates renamed itself O’Reilly Media, Inc.⁠[2][3]

In 2005 the company launched MAKE magazine, the first Science Foo Camp was held at Google, O’Reilly supported the Google Library Project, and Wired profiled him as “The Trend Spotter.” In 2006 the first Maker Faire and the first Velocity conference took place, Ignite launched and the first TOC (Tools of Change for Publishing) conference was held; that year O’Reilly launched the venture firm O’Reilly AlphaTech Ventures (OATV) with Mark Jacobsen and Bryce Roberts.⁠[3]

In 2008 O’Reilly urged web companies to “create more value than you capture.” In 2009 he published “Government as a Platform,” and the Gov 2.0 Summit was held.⁠[3]

In 2010 Inc. called him “The Oracle of Silicon Valley,” and he joined the board of the nonprofit Code for America. The first Strata conference launched in 2011, and in 2012 Maker Media was spun out of O’Reilly Media.⁠[3][2]

In 2014 O’Reilly Media bought out Pearson’s share of Safari Books Online, making Safari a wholly owned subsidiary; that year O’Reilly helped launch the GovTech Fund.⁠[3][2]

In 2015 he launched the WTF Economy publication on Medium and the Next:Economy Summit. In 2016 the company launched the O’Reilly AI Conference, and he spoke at the White House Frontiers Conference.⁠[3]

In 2017 Harper Business published O’Reilly’s book WTF? What’s the Future and Why It’s Up to Us, which examines human agency in shaping the future amid the coming wave of AI. That year the company integrated O’Reilly Media and Safari into a single learning platform.⁠[3]

On October 12, 2017, Andreessen HorowitzAndreessen HorowitzAndreessen Horowitz (a16z) is a venture capital firm founded in 2009 by Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz. It invests from the seed stage through the growth stage and provides operational support to its portfolio companies.Open the full entry (a16z) released the episode “a16z Podcast: Platforming the Future,” a conversation between O’Reilly and a16z partner and technology analyst Benedict Evans. The episode draws on his new book: having watched several waves of technology in Silicon Valley over three decades, O’Reilly argues that the latest wave is different partly because of the combinatorial inventions it makes possible.⁠[4]

They discuss how big technology platforms relate to the ecosystems they operate in, the strategic choices and responsibilities platforms take on for those ecosystems, why some platforms compete with their own ecosystems, and how algorithms shape economic culture and markets. The episode was uploaded to the a16z YouTubeYouTubeYouTube is Google’s video-sharing and creator platform, founded in 2005 by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim and acquired by Google in 2006. Built around video uploading, viewing, and creator earnings, the platform has developed Shorts, YouTube Music, Premium, YouTube TV, and products for children, and is headquartered in San Bruno, California, United States.Open the full entry channel on January 1, 2019, under the title “a16z Podcast | Platforming the Future.”⁠[4][5]

O’Reilly now focuses on mechanism design for the human–AI economy, which he describes as “reverse game theory.” He co-founded the nonprofit AI Disclosures Project with Ilan Strauss and writes on Substack through O’Reilly Radar, Asimov’s Addendum and Conversations with AI.⁠[3]

His activities include publishing books, running online conferences and investing in early-stage startups.⁠[3]

O’Reilly Media: Official website: https://www.oreilly.com/ (opens in a new window).⁠[3]

X: Public account: https://x.com/timoreilly (opens in a new window).⁠[3]

LinkedInLinkedInLinkedIn is a social networking platform for professionals. It was founded in 2002 by Reid Hoffman and others, launched in 2003, and listed on the New York Stock Exchange in 2011; after Microsoft acquired it for approximately $26.2 billion in 2016, it became a wholly owned Microsoft subsidiary. Its revenue comes from membership subscriptions, advertising, and recruitment solutions.Open the full entry: Public profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/timo3/ (opens in a new window).⁠[3]