Rob Malda (born May 10, 1976), also known as CmdrTaco, is an American Internet content author, and former editor-in-chief of the website
Slashdot
''Slashdot'' (sometimes abbreviated as ''/.'') is a social news website that originally advertised itself as "News for Nerds. Stuff that Matters". It features news stories concerning science, technology, and politics that are submitted and eval ...
.
Career
Malda is an
alumnus
Alumni (singular: alumnus (masculine) or alumna (feminine)) are former students of a school, college, or university who have either attended or graduated in some fashion from the institution. The feminine plural alumnae is sometimes used for grou ...
of
Hope College and
Holland Christian High School
Holland Christian High School is a private, Calvinist high school in the city of Holland, Michigan. Holland Christian's colors are maroon and white, and their nickname is "The Maroons". Holland Christian High School is the only grade 9–12 build ...
. In 1997, Malda and
Jeff Bates created
Slashdot
''Slashdot'' (sometimes abbreviated as ''/.'') is a social news website that originally advertised itself as "News for Nerds. Stuff that Matters". It features news stories concerning science, technology, and politics that are submitted and eval ...
while undergraduates of
Hope College. After managing the site for two years "on a shoestring", they sold the site to
Andover.net, which was later acquired by
VA Linux Systems
Geeknet, Inc. is a Fairfax County, Virginia–based company that is a subsidiary of GameStop. The company was formerly known as VA Research, VA Linux Systems, VA Software, and SourceForge, Inc.
History VA Research
VA Research was founded in Nove ...
. Malda ran the site out of the
SourceForge, Inc. office in
Dexter, Michigan.
Rob Malda also wrote a monthly
column
A column or pillar in architecture and structural engineering is a structural element that transmits, through compression (physical), compression, the weight of the structure above to other structural elements below. In other words, a column i ...
for the magazine ''Computer Power User''. In 2002, he was named in the
MIT Technology Review
''MIT Technology Review'' is a bimonthly magazine wholly owned by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and editorially independent of the university. It was founded in 1899 as ''The Technology Review'', and was re-launched without "The" in ...
TR100
The Innovators Under 35 is a peer-reviewed annual award and listicle published by ''MIT Technology Review'' magazine, naming the world's top 35 innovators under the age of 35. at ''Technology Review'' with lists of winners at technologyreview.com
...
as one of the top 100 innovators in the world younger than the age of 35.
On August 25, 2011, Rob Malda announced his resignation from Slashdot. On March 5, 2012, Malda was appointed as Chief Strategist and Editor-at-Large of
WaPo Labs, a subsidiary of
The Washington Post Company. After The Washington Post Company sold its newspaper operations to Amazon.com CEO Jeff Bezos, the company was renamed
Graham Holdings Company. WaPo Labs became
Trove
Trove is an Australian online library database owned by the National Library of Australia in which it holds partnerships with source providers National and State Libraries Australia, an aggregator and service which includes full text documen ...
, for which Malda was Chief Strategist and Head of Product, before it was terminated in December, 2015.
Personal life
Malda was married to longtime girlfriend Kathleen Fent on December 8, 2002, in
Las Vegas
Las Vegas (; Spanish for "The Meadows"), often known simply as Vegas, is the 25th-most populous city in the United States, the most populous city in the state of Nevada, and the county seat of Clark County. The city anchors the Las Veg ...
,
Nevada
Nevada ( ; ) is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, Western region of the United States. It is bordered by Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. N ...
.
, having had a proposal displayed on the website Slashdot on February 14, 2002.
References
External links
Personal homepageCmdrTaco interviewon the FLOSS
Podcast
A podcast is a program made available in digital format for download over the Internet. For example, an episodic series of digital audio or video files that a user can download to a personal device to listen to at a time of their choosin ...
Rob's resignation post on Slashdot
{{DEFAULTSORT:Malda, Rob
1976 births
Living people
American Internet celebrities
Businesspeople in information technology
Businesspeople in software
Geeknet
Hope College alumni
People from Holland, Michigan
Slashdot
People from Dexter, Michigan