My Businesses Not Wolfram Research
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Wolfram My Businesses Not Wolfram Research
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I understand from Stephen Wolfram's Biography that he is a genius. He was so busy writing his book about the "future of science" that he didn't foresee the popularity of the web in 1997, which is when my friend Bill Morris registered wolfram.org for me. (hmmm) So I must have been totally lucky that he didn't register wolfram.org when he secured wolfram.com.
A while later, Scott Korandaan asked if he could have wolfram.org for a new school that they're building. I was disappointed when he refused my counter offer to trade wolfram.org domain for wolfram.com. I also offered to lease wolfram.org to them because I wasn't using it yet. He said no to both those offers -- of course. By then I knew Dr. Wolfram was smart.
Next, Dr. Wolfram's assistant offered to buy me ewolfram.com, and exchange it for my wolfram.org! I guess I deserved that, but I didn't write back. Only then, a few weeks later, did they offer $4000 for wolfram.org! Wow, $4k for a ".org" address -- I was impressed. But although 4k is a lot of money for something I only paid $70 for (over 2000% profit?) I didn't feel good about selling it. It is my name.
I figured, I got to wolfram.org first. And obviously I registered it for a reason. And $4K is chicken feed compared to a location that is mine for the annals of web history. Put it this way, after taxes, $4K is more like $2K, and $2K isn't even a months rent in San Francisco!
I finally did some research and discovered that Stephen Wolfram was running a $350 million dollar company and he had already registered all these other domains! wolfram-science.org , stephen-wolfram.org , stephenwolfram.org , complex-systems.org , cellularautomata.org , wolframscience.org , cellular-automata.org , wolfram-institute.org , math-world.com , mathsites.com , wizpower.com , wri.com , mathematica.com , scienceworld.com , wolfram.com , science-world.com , wolfram-media.com , graphica.com , new-science.com , activesites.com , integrals.com , mathsource.com , wolfram-research.com , mathlink.com , mathworld.com , howabout.com , tgjb.com , publicon.com , mathscript.com , bignumbers.com , mathjournal.com , mathematica-journal.com , specialfunctions.com , mathchat.com , mathdirect.com , wolfram-science.com , wolframresearch.com , stephenwolfram.com , stephen-wolfram.com , wolframscience.com , wolfram-institute.com , complex-systems.com , calculuswiz.com
Why did he need wolfram.org too? Many of his domains still aren't in use. Why would someone who wants to unify physics into a single fundamental theory need 45 domain names to unify his web pages? The very thought was absurd!
I believe that a single web address can accomplish all that Dr. Stephen Wolfram needs to say -- his views on what science will be like this new milinium, his thoughts on creating machines that think, our hopes of finding extraterrestrial intelligence, and his views on changing the way basic science is organized. One -- maybe two or three -- domains but certainly not 45 domains. Certainly not MINE too!
I started to understand that Mr. Wolfram simply needed a good information designer -- not another domain name. I tried to tell him that. I tried to offer my services, which at the time, I thought were most excellent. But Mr. Wolfram's assistant insisted that they needed my domain (I know, I know -- it's the marketing people...)
So I went to my calculater and figured that those 44 domains they already bought had cost them $3080 to buy plus $1540 per year to maintain! Wow, they have a domain name budget! So I decided to base the price on Dr. Wolfram's net worth (I figured $100,000 was a fair point to start), and, in addition, I decided to ask for perpetual use of the email addresses eric@wolfram.org, eric@wolfram.com, and the web domains eric.wolfram.com and eric.wolfram.org.
I quickly got a reply. For some reason, they decided to "stop wasting both of our times", as they put it, and said "Wolfram Research and its related companies are not prepared to enter into any of the arrangements which you describe...however, in the future, if you decide that you would like to sell the wolfram.org domain, please do get in touch with me."
Ha! Ya right!
What got me was that when they frist contacted me it was "hey, I'm an assistant from a Dr. at a university who wants to open a new school" and now it's all "Wolfram Research and Related company" It's come to this?!? They did, however, sent me a copy of Mathematica and I appreciated that and thanked them! A mighty find gesture.
Still, I must say that I was a tad miffed because I never got to speak with the Good Doctor himself, nor did I get to discuss my views on what science will be like in the 21st century. (which he could have put in his book!) And they never sent me the signed copy of Mr. Wolfram's book, which I requested. I just waited and waited. Oh well, no one realized that the book would actually come out until 2002 -- not 1998 like they were planning. And I guess they forgot about me and my domain by now. And I probably would have read his book too...
In an alternate universe, however, this site might have been about math -- now it's just about me -- Eric Wolfram.
It's not about mathematica sdk, mathworld, partition of unity, statistics, trigonometric identities, substitution integral or a linear bounded either.