Wes Boyd

Wes Boyd (born c.1960) is an American software developer and political organizer. In 1987, he and his wife Joan Blades co-founded Berkeley Systems, a San Francisco Bay area software company.[1] After selling the company in 1997, Boyd and Blades went on to found the liberal political group MoveOn.org in 1998.[2][3][4][5]

Early life and education

He was born in 1960.[6][3][7] Native to Berkeley, California,[7] he was active with computers at age 14, then later dropped out of college to pursue his interest in software design.[3]

Career

Berkeley Systems

He was a programmer at the University of California Berkeley for several years. Afterwards, he created software for PC users who were visually impaired.[3]

In 1987 he founded Berkeley Systems with Joan Blades, with Boyd serving as technical expert and CEO.[3]

In 1990, he was Berkeley Systems president, and had been working with Marc Sutton on software to aid sight-impaired computer users. It was also selling mass-market Mac utilities.[8]

In the early 1990s, Boyd's popular screen saver bundle had brought in several millions of dollars. By the end of the 1990s, he left that business, and became politically active.

By the late 1990s, the company employed 150 people and made around $30 million a year in sales.[3]

He sold the company to CUC International for $25 million[9] in 1997.[7]

MoveOn.org

He and his wife Joan Blades in 1998 founded MoveOn.org online.[3] A one-sentence petition to move on from the Clinton scandal was first sent to several-hundred friends and family, and "very shortly" they had half a million people involved.[10] The email involved a simple online submission form.[11]

The site moveon.org appeared September 18, 1998 with the sole purpose of building a petition to express disapproval of Bill Clinton, call for a "quick censure" and move on to other issues. Boyd and Blades styled it as a "flash campaign."[12]

When the signatures were collected, Boyd and Blades printed out 20,000 pages of email and had them hand-delivered to every member of the House of Congress. By 1999, the organization had raised $12 million in pledges to congressional campaigns of people who had not voted in favor of impeachment.[13] It did so through the PAC MoveOn Political Action Committee.[11] In 2000, the organization petitioned Ralph Nader to drop out of the 2000 presidential race so he wouldn't draw votes from Al Gore.[14] In 2002, they supported Paul Wellstone.[11]

In 2004, Boyd and Blades were named NPT Executives of the Year by the Nonprofit Times.[15]

By 2008, it had an email list of 4.2 million names and had donated $118 into political matters, such as "opposing U.S. involvement in the Iraq war, supporting an unregulated Internet and helping hurricane victims find temporary housing, among other activities. The group runs ads on television, on the Internet and in newspapers and magazines."[16]

Personal life

Boyd is married to Joan Blades, also his long-term business partner. They have two children[17] and live in Berkeley.[6]

References
  1. Bozman, Jean S. (1990) "Macs talk to visually impaired", Computerworld, June 4, 1990. Retrieved November 16, 2013
  2. Crumlish, Christian The Power of Many: How the Living Web Is Transforming Politics, Business, And Everyday Life, Sybex, ISBN 978-0782151091, p. 30
  3. "Wes Boyd". notablebiographies.com. Retrieved 16 November 2013.
  4. "Wes Boyd". newsle.com. Retrieved 16 November 2013.
  5. Wolf, Gary. "Weapons of Mass Mobilization". wired.com. Retrieved 16 November 2013.
  6. "Wes Boyd Biography". Retrieved December 14, 2020.
  7. Harris, Scott Duke (February 29, 2004). "The news cycle had downshifted for the..." Los Angeles Times. Retrieved December 13, 2020.
  8. Bozman, Jean S. (June 4, 1990). "Macs talk to visually impaired". Computerworld. Retrieved December 11, 2020.
  9. Thompson, Chris (July 2, 2003). "The Rise of Point & Click Liberalism". EastBayExpress. Retrieved December 11, 2020.
  10. Mayo, Keenan (July 2008). "How the Web Was Won". Vanity Fair.
  11. Winters, Ben (February 28, 2003). "You Make the Call". In These Times. Retrieved December 10, 2020.
  12. Schwartz, John (October 12, 1998). "Sometimes Email Just Doesn't Deliver". The Washington Post. Retrieved December 11, 2020.
  13. Fryer, Bronwyn (March 1999). ">Fwd: Fwd: Re: Read This Now". Mother Jones.
  14. O'Reilly, Dennis (February 12, 2004). "Can the Internet Save Democracy?". PCWorld.
  15. Gloeckner, Erin (December 1, 2004). "NPT Executives of the Year". The NonProfit Times. Retrieved December 11, 2020.
  16. Weeks, Linton (September 22, 2008). "Ten Years Later, MoveOn Is 4.2 Million Strong". NPR. Retrieved December 11, 2020.
  17. Marech, Rona (December 29, 2000). "Grass Roots From Berkeley Sprout Online". SFGate. Retrieved December 11, 2020.
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