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Paul Baran (1927 - 2011)
Internet pioneer, electrical engineer

Paul Baran, 84, whose work with packaging data in the 1960s is credited with playing a role in the later development of the Internet, died of complications from lung cancer Saturday at his home in Palo Alto, Calif.

Mr. Baran, who was raised in West Philadelphia and earned his bachelor's degree in electrical engineering from Drexel University, is best known for the idea of "packet-switching," in which data are bundled into small packages and sent through a network. He outlined the concept while working on Cold War issues for the Rand Corporation in 1963 and 1964.

In 1969, the technology became a concept the Defense Department used in creating the Arpanet, the precursor to the Internet, numerous reports on the subject said. The idea had been so advanced at its development that private companies had passed on it.

It would be decades before the social and commercial possibilities of the technology would become clear, and Mr. Baran would miss out on a lot of the money and glory that came with it, but he was happy to live to see it happen, his son David said.

"He was a man of infinite patience," David Baran said.

President George W. Bush bestowed the National Medal of Technology and Innovation on Mr. Baran in 2008. A year earlier, he was inducted into the Inventors Hall of Fame in Akron, Ohio, joining the likes of Thomas Edison.

Source: Philadelphia Inquirer, Mar. 29, 2011

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