Dr Nigel Roberts

FIoD The Institute of Directors (IoD) is a British professional organisation for company directors, senior business leaders and entrepreneurs. It is the UK's longest running organisation for professional leaders, having been founded in 1903 and incor ...

FBCS Sir Maurice Wilkes served as the first President of BCS in 1957 BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT, known as the British Computer Society until 2009, is a professional body and a learned society that represents those working in infor ...

FRSA The Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce (RSA), also known as the Royal Society of Arts, is a London-based organisation committed to finding practical solutions to social challenges. The RSA acronym is used m ...

is a British computer scientist.

Early life

Roberts was born in

Liverpool Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a populat ...

and grew up in

Lancashire Lancashire ( , ; abbreviated Lancs) is the name of a historic county, ceremonial county, and non-metropolitan county in North West England. The boundaries of these three areas differ significantly. The non-metropolitan county of Lancash ...

Education

Educated at

Wigan Wigan ( ) is a large town in Greater Manchester, England, on the River Douglas. The town is midway between the two cities of Manchester, to the south-east, and Liverpool, to the south-west. Bolton lies to the north-east and Warrington t ...

and Prescot Grammar Schools, he received his first degree in

Computer Science Computer science is the study of computation, automation, and information. Computer science spans theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, information theory, and automation) to practical disciplines (includi ...

from

Essex University The University of Essex is a public research university in Essex, England. Established by royal charter in 1965, Essex is one of the original plate glass universities. Essex's shield consists of the ancient arms attributed to the Kingdom of Ess ...

. Whilst at Essex, he was one of the group of students who conceived and developed the world's first multi-user computer game (MUD) along with

Roy Trubshaw ''Multi-User Dungeon'', or ''MUD'' (referred to as ''MUD1'', to distinguish it from its successor, ''MUD2'', and the MUD genre in general), is the first MUD. History MUD was created in 1978 by Roy Trubshaw and Richard Bartle at the Unive ...

and

Richard Bartle Richard Allan Bartle FBCS FRSA (born 10 January 1960) is a British writer, professor and game researcher in the massively multiplayer online game industry. He co-created ''MUD1'' (the first MUD) in 1978, and is the author of the 2003 book ''De ...

. In 2008 he was awarded a

First First or 1st is the ordinal form of the number one (#1). First or 1st may also refer to: *World record, specifically the first instance of a particular achievement Arts and media Music * 1$T, American rapper, singer-songwriter, DJ, and rec ...

in law from the

Open University The Open University (OU) is a British public research university and the largest university in the United Kingdom by number of students. The majority of the OU's undergraduate students are based in the United Kingdom and principally study off- ...

and the

College of Law A law school (also known as a law centre or college of law) is an institution specializing in legal education, usually involved as part of a process for becoming a lawyer within a given jurisdiction. Law degrees Argentina In Argentina, ...

(now known as the University of Law).

Honours

On 7 June 2022 it was announced that he would be awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of Essex. The degree of

Doctor of the University An honorary degree is an academic degree for which a university (or other degree-awarding institution) has waived all of the usual requirements. It is also known by the Latin phrases ''honoris causa'' ("for the sake of the honour") or ''ad hono ...

was conferred at the commencement ceremony on 18 July 2022.

Career

His first job was with

Digital Equipment Corporation Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC ), using the trademark Digital, was a major American company in the computer industry from the 1960s to the 1990s. The company was co-founded by Ken Olsen and Harlan Anderson in 1957. Olsen was president un ...

(DEC) as a software engineer, where (among other projects) he subsequently worked on the pioneering

ALL-IN-1 ALL-IN-1 was an office automation product developed and sold by Digital Equipment Corporation in the 1980s. It was one of the first purchasable off the shelf electronic mail products. It was later known as ''Office Server V3.2 for OpenVMS Alpha a ...

email and office automation system. In 1996 he founded the Island Networks group of companies, including CHANNELISLES.NET, the registry operator of the

.gg .gg is the country code top-level domain for the Bailiwick of Guernsey. The domain is administered by Island Networks, who also administer the .je domain for neighbouring territory Jersey. The domain was chosen as other possible codes were al ...

and

.je .je is the country code top-level domain for Jersey. The domain is administered by Island Networks, who also administer the .gg domain for neighbouring territory Guernsey. In 2003, a Google Search website was made available for Jersey, which us ...

top level domain A top-level domain (TLD) is one of the domains at the highest level in the hierarchical Domain Name System of the Internet after the root domain. The top-level domain names are installed in the root zone of the name space. For all domains in ...

s for Guernsey and

Jersey Jersey ( , ; nrf, Jèrri, label= Jèrriais ), officially the Bailiwick of Jersey (french: Bailliage de Jersey, links=no; Jèrriais: ), is an island country and self-governing Crown Dependency near the coast of north-west France. It is the l ...

. In 2005 he became the first person in the UK to obtain damages in court in a lawsuit against a sender of unsolicited email.

ICANN

In 1999, Roberts was one of the original members of the ICANN DNSO Names Council, representing the

ccTLD A country code top-level domain (ccTLD) is an Internet top-level domain generally used or reserved for a country, sovereign state, or dependent territory identified with a country code. All ASCII ccTLD identifiers are two letters long, and all ...

constituency. and has been an active participant at ICANN since its foundation. He was one of the participants in the US Government's ''International Forum on the White Paper'' (IFWP) in 1997–1998, which led to ICANN's creation. Roberts later served as one of three elected councillors representing Europe on ICANN's ccNSO Council, one of the two successor bodies to the ''Names Council'' between 2013 and the end of June 2018. In September 2017 he was proposed to the ICANN board of directors by

.pr .pr is the Internet country code top-level domain (ccTLD) for Puerto Rico. A .pr.us second-level domain has been reserved for Puerto Rico under the .us locality namespace, but it is unused. Agencies of the government of Puerto Rico use either ...

''(

Puerto Rico Puerto Rico (; abbreviated PR; tnq, Boriken, ''Borinquen''), officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico ( es, link=yes, Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico, lit=Free Associated State of Puerto Rico), is a Caribbean island and unincorporated ...

)'',

.ci .ci is the Internet country code top-level domain (ccTLD) for Côte d'Ivoire Ivory Coast, also known as Côte d'Ivoire, officially the Republic of Côte d'Ivoire, is a country on the southern coast of West Africa. Its capital is Yamousso ...

''( Côte d'Ivoire)'' and

.be .be is the Internet country code top-level domain (ccTLD) for Belgium. As of November 2022 there are 1,746,459 registered domains. History The domain became active in 1989 and was administrated by Pierre Verbaeten of the Katholieke Universiteit ...

''(

Belgium Belgium, ; french: Belgique ; german: Belgien officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. The country is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, France to th ...

)''. In the subsequent world-wide poll, he was elected receiving 67% of the vote. He served as a director on the ICANN board between October 2018 and October 2021

Politics

He ran as a

Liberal Democrat Several political parties from around the world have been called the Liberal Democratic Party or Liberal Democrats. These parties usually follow a liberal democratic ideology. Active parties Former parties See also *Liberal democracy *Lib ...

for the UK Parliament in the

Ipswich Ipswich () is a port town and borough in Suffolk, England, of which it is the county town. The town is located in East Anglia about away from the mouth of the River Orwell and the North Sea. Ipswich is both on the Great Eastern Main Line ...

Constituency in the 1997 General Election and later served as an elected member of the Alderney legislature (the States of Alderney) during 2002–2003.

Radio &c

Roberts was a board director and council member of the

Radio Society of Great Britain The Radio Society of Great Britain (RSGB) is the United Kingdom's recognised national society for amateur radio operators. The society was founded in 1913 as the London Wireless Club, making it one of the oldest organisations of its kind in the ...

between 1991 and 1996. He holds the amateur radio callsign GU4IJF. He presents an occasional music programme on Channel Island local FM and DAB radio station

QUAY-FM QUAY-FM is a VHF-FM broadcasting station on the island of Alderney. It holds the only Community Radio licence in the Channel Islands which was granted in 2014 to the ''Alderney Broadcasting Company'' (a non-profit organisation, limited by guarant ...

and serves as a director of its owner, not-for-profit Alderney Broadcasting Co. Ltd. In November 2021 he joined the board of the Royal Connaught Residential Home.

Professional societies

Roberts has been a Chartered Fellow of the British Computer Society since 2005. He was awarded Fellowship of the Royal Society of Arts in 2016 and became a Fellow of the

Institute of Directors The Institute of Directors (IoD) is a British professional organisation for company directors, senior business leaders and entrepreneurs. It is the UK's longest running organisation for professional leaders, having been founded in 1903 and incor ...

in 2019. He is a

Chartered Engineer Regulation and licensure in engineering is established by various jurisdictions of the world to encourage life, public welfare, safety, well-being, then environment and other interests of the general public and to define the licensure process thr ...

, a

European Engineer European Engineer (EUR ING) is an international professional qualification and title for highly qualified engineers used in over 32 European countries. Contemporary EUR ING engineers are degree-qualified and have gained the highest level of profes ...

and a Chartered IT Professional. He is a member of the British Computer Society's ''Fellows' Technical Advisory Group (F-TAG)''

References

External links

CHANNELISLES.NET

US Government's International Forum on the White Paper
{{DEFAULTSORT:Roberts, Nigel Living people Year of birth missing (living people) States of Alderney Members British computer scientists European amateur radio operators Alumni of the University of Essex Fellows of the British Computer Society People educated at Prescot Grammar School