H. Elwood Gilliland III,
Alumnus

"A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is still putting on its shoes." - Mark Twain

I <3 the planet. I'm entrepreneurial. I do business internationally. I like fair and forgiving contracts.
I type at 106 wpm with 99.2% accuracy according to the ABC Business Centers
Microsoft Word typing speed test battery. My IQ is 156.



I have never served in the military, however I did take the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery (ASVAB). I scored a 96 in 10 minutes and it is a 30 minute exam. They didn't tell me what question I missed (I only missed 1) but I'm pretty sure it was the helicopter-related question. My cousin is a doctor of national security and is currently stationed in Iraq.

I have written a patent pending cancer detection software. Please help by hiring this quality CMU graduate.

Try my great LGFDL usability query.

Email me at heg-at-andrew.cmu.edu
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Download a humorous and informative business proposal in PDF (aka The Brain Pod Proposal)
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I prefer SeaMonkey on SUSE.

I'm developing a video game engine in my spare time. It uses libAgar, where I manage the Agar Wiki. It also uses SDL, libCURL, OpenGL, eNET and libJPEG.

When you type domain names into FireFox for companies that do not exist, like "UraniumGames.com", a company registers your domain mistype and puts up a dummy web page designed to sell the domain name. It becomes registered within a few weeks but the process is not instantaneous. If you do not buy the domain name within a few hours of typing the domain, it will become the property of other people.

Michael Arrington, who is a well known name in the tech industry, wrote the following article (one of a series of 3 articles) about me and my claim that I invented the YouTube brand. In another article, Michael explains that he has the resources to help me, but wouldn't want to. In this article from the Washington Post, Michael tells me to move to another apartment and get a job. At Davos 2009, Michael Arrington announces he used to "party with Chad" before the "YouTube thing".

Favorite Chad Hurley quote about the beginning of YouTube: "I guess there really wasn't one instance where we -- you know - made it."
Watch: Yoooouuutuuube.com

From Gawker:
Chad and Steve both say that the party did occur but that Karim wasn't there. "Chad and I are pretty modest, and Jawed has tried to seize every opportunity to take credit," Steve told me. But he also acknowledged that the notion that YouTube was founded after a dinner "was probably very strengthened by marketing ideas around creating a story that was very digestible."

The Fourth YouTuber

Michael Arrington
TechCrunch.com
Saturday, November 8, 2008; 11:55 PM

Most venture capitalists will tell you that a good idea isn't worth much - the value is in execution, which is very hard. But that doesn't stop people from coming forward to take credit when someone hits a home run. We saw it with Google and countless others. Someone gets rich, and someone else says they stole the idea.

This time it's YouTube. Herbert Elwood Gilliland III emails us to say that YouTube's name and idea was his, and that he told Chad Hurley about it years ago. After a different conversation he says he had with Sergey Brin in 2007, more of his ideas appeared in YouTube:

I'm writing you because I am looking for some media outlet to cover my situation. I invented the YouTube brand and worked at a company where I was developing a similar product in 1998. I inverted several key elements of the product "Synthetic Interview" to create YouTube, and shared this idea with my friends. I also tried to create a company called YouTube several times between 1998-2004, when in November, I talked to Chad Hurley on the phone when he was still working at PayPal. I explained the idea behind YouTube, the brand name, and challenged him to start the company since he had close ties to Peter Theil, a well known billionaire venture capitalist. I asked for 1% of the proceeds of the sale of the company in exchange for this great idea. Years later, I am still trying to get Chad to recognize me with fiscal compensation and/or credit for creating the brand, basic concepts (video uploading, video commenting, agnostic video format, layout of the main video screen, awards and top listings "most watched", star ratings, viewers, DMCA automation, video and audio fingerprinting).After a phone call with Sergey Brin in August of 2007, several other of my ideas became a part of YouTube (thumbs-up and thumbs-down, video annotation). Since they seem to depend so much on my ideas to make their billions, why can't they then see the benefit in enabling me to start my own firm? Why do these "altruistic" billionaires not see the benefit in sharing some of their wealth?¿H. E. Gilliland III"Astronomy compels the soul to look upwards and leads us from this world to another."? Plato <- this is in the original article

I haven't emailed YouTube founders Chad Hurley, Steve Chen and Jawed Karim to get their side of the story, but I'm guessing they aren't going to credit Gilliland with as much as a comment on this, let alone sending him a check.

Gilliland has says his specialties are "Security, networking, interface, process consulting, medical devices (and requirements), graphic design, advertising, web design, product development" on his LinkedIn profile, and he types106 words per minute. What does he want exactly? $1 million dollars. To become a doctor.

My advice to Gilliand is to get a job, move out of his friend's apartment and stop calling people with all these ideas.


I was sent a letter from Steve Jobs' attorney after I attempted to give Apple an idea via fax (I was instructed by the receptionist and given Steve Jobs' fax number). They gave me three options: 1) come pick it up 2) pay for them to ship it 3) permit them to destroy it. I picked option 3.

I convinced Chris Crocker not to do his reality TV show. It didn't take much.

My first appearance in a video game was as Locke in the game Final Fantasy. Locke from Final Fantasy is a reincarnation of my MUD persona, Locke, for which I am mildly famous in the cult world of multi-user dungeons (MUDs). Locke is a Wizard/Thief, much like my MUD character. I am famous in MUDs because I co-authored "Online Creation (OLC)", an add-on for the popular MUD engine Merc/Diku which has been used by thousands of MUD service providers since 1993. Download my MUD software for Linux or play it with telnet

I am CTO and own 15% of PickPark. The company ownership percentage was given to me by its CEO after he saw my "I Invented YouTube" video. I also own the trademark Gudagi as well as the domain and website, Gudagi.com, a place to collaborate and share data with your friends, create your own videogame, radio or TV portal.

I was caricatured in Fallout 3 as "Herbert 'Daring' Dashwood" - the character was a bearded, well-to-do ex-adventurer who had retired. This is probably because I've creatively played so many adventure games (and still do). The character mirrors my "retirement" from adventure game design (I have since moved on to prototyping a shared strategy/adventure game). This happened due to the influence of my colleagues Jay Woodward and Fred Zeleny, two friends and former classmates that had something to do with early Demiurge Studios, and played a role in the production of Bethesda's Fallout 3. It's still one of the most intriguing science fiction "thematic worlds" to emerge from video gaming, although the Fallout game technicals are a bit rough around the edges (in parts). I think the originality displayed by Tim Cain (from Black Isle, creator of the in-game systems) is a model to be followed for combining aesthetic, story and humor regarding the use of science fiction in video games. Many consider it to be the spiritual successor to Wasteland, but Fallout 3 secures itself as a science fiction successor to Wasteland, Planetfall, 2400AD and other classic PC titles, done with much attention paid to quality interactive storytelling. I adore these games, including one of my all-time favorite post-nuclear holocaust video games, Alphaman, which provides an interesting proof-of-concept (POC) that later was upstaged by the original Fallout.

I pushed for more of this cartoon science fiction, since that particular part of gaming has been severely lacking in sophistication for mainstream titles. For me this was part of the motivation helping SPORE(tm) at EA/Maxis. One of the metaphors I used for the aesthetic of SPORE's space game was "Spaceman Spiff! but a video game. (for the space part)" -- science fiction works wonders as a pseudo-educational cartoon for both young and old audiences. The EA rep explained they had little plan for the space game in 2003. The project was only on its first legs: SPORE could be built, in my opinion, with existing EA game frameworks present in Tribes, Accolade's Star Control and Starflight. Starflight also was a heavy influence on Mass Effect. I also suggested "lite" multiplayer mode by integrating SPORE with the web. Yay, me. I also got a chance to talk to the head of the Mass Effect project, reminding him to take a look at Starflight for story ideas. I've also talked to TC Lee one of the original members of Binary Systems, the studio that produced Starflight.

In 2001 I encountered Dave Andersen and explained the idea of file footprints and the software version of the Akamai proxy service. I talked about the swarming aspect of file downloading; this had much to do with my explorations into YouTube's file fingerprinting features. Dave went on to write this paper which became the foundation for BitTorrent. I've spent some time with the BitTornado people, trying to get a BitTorrent-like protocol to be "web URL aware", an oversight on the original BitTorrent.

Stuey from the Family Guy shares many traits with me: he's a chaotic megalomaniac, adopted, and I do his voice perfectly and have for years. He also likes dogs. Several times in my life Hollywood has "lifted" things from me -- as is the nature of telepathy I guess -- and I have been able to predict the future with supreme accuracy on more than one occasion in a demonstrable way to other people. Who knows, maybe you'll be the next lucky person to receive my gift - of course, you probably already have. I spent a great deal of time meditating transcendentally in the late 90s and acheived a level of enlightenment equal to a master buddhist. My level of discipline was quite high. I was able to induce OBE instantaneously and my mind traveled to the special place that I can only describe as "The Soul Collector" -- a common hallucination reported during near-death experiences. This occurred without the use of drugs. I promptly took a 9 year hiatus from deep meditation after this acheivement, and I still remain out of the depths today. I believe this is the best thing for me at this time and I plan to stay on the discipline of non-meditation until I have achieved certain personal Earthly goals.

Lowry Burgess once described me as "Prometheus"; specifically, "he who stole fire from the gods to warm humans" -- in his interpretation, fire is the technology that I warm humans with.

In 1999, at a start-up on Henry Street in the University Technology Development Center called Grand Illusion Studios, owned by Don Marinelli and Scott Stevens, I invented the YouTube Brand. In 2004, I contacted Chad Hurley at PayPal and told him my idea. I asked for 1%, which has never been paid. I had to finish my degree, so I didn't start the company. I have a prepared statement on the event. After publically announcing my involvement, I left a message for Sergei Brin and Larry Page and Sergei called me back. This is when I told him my Virgle joke and he shared it with Richard Branson and even made a video of it! How cool.

After appearing in TechCrunch as "The Fourth YouTuber", I was parodied by iJustine. Karma got her!! She broke her iPhone after she made fun of my YouTube video "I Invented YouTube".

I'm friends with the Pieman.

Education
Bachelor of Science, Interaction Design (Self-Defined Major), Carnegie Mellon University
Minors in Art and Multimedia Production

Hobbies and interests:
dromology, video games, quantum intelligent machines, immortality and life extension, home environmental sciences, turning a garage into an amassed fortune

Organizational Membership
IEEE Professional
FAS Scientist (Federation of American Scientists)

Career highlights
CAFT (Center for Advanced Fuel Technologies), biodegradable fuel research confidential clearance
General Motors, product development, H3 "Make it smaller!"*
iSee, concept and packaging I coined the term "the path of least surveillance" and authored the concept for IAA operatives during a brainstorming session in 1999.
STUDIO for Creative Inquiry, artist/contributor
United States Golf Association, technical consultant
Contributer to Processing PDE (a site from which I am banned for eternity)
Inventor of YouTube

Other Clients
Citizen's Bank of PA
Grand Illusion Studios, Digital Video Producer
MEDRAD, Inc., Security/Analyst
Respironics, Software Developer
Eaton Cutler Hammer
Hilton Law Offices, consultant

Slice (screenshot)Video Games
American Corporation, Unreal Tournament MOD, 1999
Demiurge Studios, insultant
Monolith Studios, F.E.A.R. Project, dromologist, effects consultant
Microsoft Games, Freelancer, story consultant
Slice, FPS open source, game, texture and level design
Spam Assassins, FPS open source, game, texture and level design
URBZ: Sims in the City, based on Escape Online, game design and concept, art direction

Publications
Goto, R., Bingham, B., Collins, T., et al. Ample Opportunity: A Community Dialogue/The Nine Mile Run Greenway Project. STUDIO for Creative Inquiry, Carnegie Mellon University, 1998.
Clifton McGill Photo Essay, C. McGill, H. Gilliland. STUDIO for Creative Inquiry 2000.
[Ctrl]SPACE, The Rhetorics of Surveillance from Bentham to Big Brother, MIT Press, 2002.
The Mod Archive, Amiga music preservation, Fledge/Watson.org, 1996.
Omnicircus CD, F. Garvey, H. Gilliland, 2000.
Only in New York, the Daily Show with Jon Stewart, August 2005.
Project Club/ESCAPE ONLINE, 1999-2002, Platform Digital LLC, 2000.
Polymorphic Server-Model for Multi-modal Agents, ISAL/ECAL, International Conference for Artificial Life, 2002.
Sight of Stillness, Carolyn Speranza, Pittsburgh Filmmakers, 2002-2003.
Transforming Nine Mile Run: Final Report, T. Collins, R. Goto, B. Bingham, R. Pell, H. Gilliland, STUDIO for Creative Inquiry, Carnegie Mellon University 2000.

Influential Writings on Usenet
A story that influenced John Wells and Michael Crichton
Another

Viral media project: DotsNotGoogle
A small Java applet, and was written about in dozens of countries on blogs and shared on the Web. Even commented on by a columnist for MacWorld. Things written about it: "It's cool!" "It's fantastic!" "Nice!!!" "You have to see this..!" "The perfect little thing to describe the concept of using dots to draw things." (Student, University of Sidney)
Others like it

Articles about iSee (a collaboration with the Institute for Applied Autonomy)
acmi, exhibition iSee
Afterimage, featured article The work of artists in a database society (excerpt)
Ars Electronica, honorary mention Net Vision
break2.2, workshop Mapping of surveillance cameras in Ljubljana city center
CcIaaResidency, workshop CcIaaResidency
ctrl[space], featured article iSee - Now more than ever, iSee, 2001
Google Video, video iSee: Now More Than Ever
flong.com, statement by Golan Levin Prix Ars Electronica 2005: Statement of the Jury in the Net Vision Category
Joi Ito's Web, featured thread Surveillance avoidance system iSee
Legal Affairs, featured article Camera Shy
nettime.org, IAA press release (one day before my birthday 2001), iSee: Paths of Least Surveillance
notbored.org, featured article Closely Watched
Playboy Magazine, featured on Playboy.com
Slashdot, featured article iSee: collaborative DiY wireless surveillance avoidance
Soundtoys, featured article The Work of Artists in a Databased Society: net.art as on-line activism +presentation
Wired Magazine, featured article Routes of Least Surveillance

Extra Curricular
San Diego Game Developers (member)
Pittsburgh Game Developers (organizer)
WRCT 88.3fm (2 years, show host and audio engineer)
ACLU (former member)
Amnesty International (lifetime member)
Key Club International (lifetime member)

Websites
Slaggarden web, logo, print
CMU VR Tour co-designer
Heartwood Ethics web designer
Interdisciplinary Studies Website (CMU) designer
ECE web applications programmer