Jakob Nielsen, Ph.D., is an influential and respected Internet expert. The New York Times named Nielsen a "guru of Web usability" for his pioneering research into creating functional and user-friendly Web sites.
A former "distinguished engineer" at Sun Microsystems, Nielsen played a leading role in reengineering the computer giant's presence on the Internet and codesigned the company intranet. He has also authored several popular books on Web functionality, including Designing Web Usability: The Practice of Simplicity and Multimedia and Hypertext:The Internet and Beyond. Nielsen's biweekly column, Alertbox, has more than 200,000 regular readers, and he frequently speaks at major technology conferences around the world.
Nielsen is principal and cofounder of the Nielsen Norman Group, a consultancy helping businesses of all sizes use technology to enhance person-to-person interaction. He also serves on the editorial boards of several high-profile technology journals, including The New Review of Hypermedia and Multimedia and Personal Technologies. He holds a doctorate in user interface and lives in northern California.