This book recounts the adventures of Louis Pouzin who invented one of the core elements for
transmitting data over today's Internet the datagram. He also created one of the most widely
used computer programming languages the Shell and is currently at age 88 a leader in the
development of a new Internet RINA. Louis Pouzin is not well known in his own country France
but is acclaimed by his peers internationally. He was ignored in France for years although he
is one of the very few French scientists who has met Queen Elizabeth II three times. This lack
of appreciation on the part of the French public is also due to the fact that despite the
motto publish or perish current in scientific circles he has an impressive list of scientific
publications but only one book in English to present his incredible achievement carried out
with an exceptional team: the Cyclades project. This book is the story of a life and a team. It
is the journey of a visionary intellectual who has always been one step ahead and has fully
adapted to the 21st century though born into a very modest family in a small village in central
France at the beginning of the 20th century... What makes Louis Pouzin so special is that he is
a leader and decision-maker who knows how to attract the right people to get projects done. He
never admits defeat even when short-sighted politicians absurdly order him to scrap his
breakthroughs. In its making this book which is written for everyone interested in the true
history of the Web has strictly respected the basic rules of any journalistic investigation:
interviews with those who made history cross-referencing of sources and documentary research.
