Role: Indian American Scientist, politician, entrepreneur
Who is Shiva Ayyadurai?
Shiva Ayyadurai is from the family of farmers in India and settled in the United States. Shiva claims that he is the inventor of email service. He is a full bright student from MIT with four degrees and lectured in two departments. Shiva is a Lemelson-MIT student prize nominee, and the entrepreneurial brains behind seven businesses.
Childhood:
Shiva Ayyadurai was born in Bombay in 1963. Grew up in a south Indian village named, Muhavur village in Rajapalayam, Tamil Nadu. By the age of 7, he left with his family to live in the United States. His mother worked at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey (UMDNJ). He used to do volunteer there while being a student at Livingston High School in New Jersey. In 1978, as a 14 year old high school student, he enroll in the computer programming at the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences of New York University (NYU). There he created the mail system. And in 1982 registered the copyright for the Software and the user documentation.
Education:
Shiva Ayyadurai got his UG degree from MIT in electrical engineering and computer science. Then, he got his Master’s Degree in Mechanical Engineering stream from MIT. After that, Shiva completed his master’s degree in visual studies from the MIT Media Laboratory on scientific visualization. Followed by UG, he did his doctorate in system Biology at MIT. For this, he got his thesis in the topic called modeling the whole cell by integrating molecular pathway models. Shiva got awarded as the Fulbright U.S. Student Program. He got permission to study of the integration of Siddha, a system of traditional medicine developed in South India, with modern systems biology by the US program.
Career Details:
Initially, in 1994, he founded a company called Millennium Cybernetics. The company used to produce Email management software. This is XIVA at first and now it got the name as Echo mail. The software designed in the way of automatic reply or forwarding it to the most relevant group. By 2001, he has customers include Kmart, American Express, and Calvin Klein. Additionally, on the echomail home page, it describes Shiva Ayyadurai as the inventor of email. Echomail major competitor is customer relationship management software which itself has an email component.
Shiva Ayyadurai Inventor of email:
Shiva a 14 year old boy developed a computer program that replicated the interoffice mail system. He named the software program as Email. With his application of copyright for the software program, the United States Copyright Office issued a Certificate of Registration, No. TXu-111-775, to him on the program in 1982. As per the regulations, he deposited a part of the software in the office. And mentioned as Email. He also received second copyright for his Email user manual Certificate of Registration, No. TXu-108-715, for the “EMAIL User’s Manual”. But unfortunately, a series of controversy has arrived regarding the email invention.
Shiva Ayyadurai has a vision to create something simple and powerful that can used by company CEO to secretary. He is the one determined the essential features of email like “Inbox”, “Outbox”, “Drafts”, “Memo” (“To:”, “From:”, “Date:”, “Subject:”, “Body:”, “Cc:”, “Bcc:”), “Attachments”, “Folders”, “Compose”, “Forward”, “Reply”, “Address Book”, “Groups”, “Return Receipt”, “Sorting”. These features made the mail system used by anyone without any technical knowledge. After this, he got recognized by the Westinghouse Science Talent Search Honors Group for his invention. In the incoming freshman class of 1,040 students of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology highlighted his invention as one among four.
Shiva Ayyadurai and genetic modification:
Shiva Ayyadurai has published a paper on applied system biology in 2015. This paper is about predicting the chemical composition of genetically modified soybeans using mathematical modeling. And that is to check whether or not they were substantially equivalent to unmodified soybeans. Through his paper, he claims that the genetically modified soy has higher levels of carcinogenic formaldehyde and lower levels of antioxidant glutathione. He also made the thing that GM soybeans are contradicting the safety measures and different from the present one. Once after he publishes the paper, he got embarked with the speaking tour of the US. In the National press club he addressed the genetic modification soy as “fundamentally modified the metabolic system of the soy”. The GM soy is disrupting the “beautiful way of detoxifying [formaldehyde]” present in non-GM soy.
Shiva Ayyadurai and covid-19:
Shiva Ayyadurai has been using internet to spread lot of controversies related to covid-19 pandemic. He wrote an open letter to Trump the president of America saying that the lockdown is necessary rather supplying dozens of Vitamins could solve the issue. The major controversy is Ayyadurai told that covid-19 was patented by the Pirbright Institute. He gave a definition to covid-19 like “an overactive dysfunctional immune system that overreacts and that’s what causes damage to the body”. He claims that the virus was spread by the “deep state” and accused Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. Finally in April 2020, QAnon supporter DeAnna Lorraine recommended Shiva Ayyadurai to be included in the Corona virus discussion which is going to be held at White house.
Shiva Ayyadurai as a politician:
Shiva is also interested in politics. He filled as a Republican candidate in the 2018 United States Senate election in Massachusetts, running against incumbent Elizabeth Warren. He also announced he would run as an independent candidate and so he gets 3.4% of vote. He also condemned Warren saying that a spineless clan that never expect to get challenged. He also added that he would take science and engineering to solve problems. He also accused Warren by saying of voting in favor of the Farmer Assurance Provision and against a GM labeling bill sponsored by Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont. But the act passed to ensure the government not to shutdown. Indeed Shiva Ayyadurai is running in the 2020 U.S. Senate election in Massachusetts as a republican.
Shiva Ayyadurai and the email controversy:
Shiva accused badly and discredits for the email system. He has been getting all those threatening phone calls, unfair online comments, and his name and work has maligned after he got the acceptance into the Smithsonian. Shiva Ayyadurai has no direct dispute with invention copyright. Attackers are attempting to discredit him against the email work. Some of the industrialist goes to that extent they claim that email is EMAIL and not email because of UMDNJ, the names of software programs, subroutines and variables written in FORTRAN IV used the upper-case naming convention. The fact is EMAIL is an email in upper case, lower case any case. Some of them told that to now attempt to confuse the public that “EMAIL” is not “email”.
Shiva Ayyadurai Books:
- In 1997, he released a book called “The Internet Publicity Guide”. This book is about how to increase marketing and production in cyberspace.
- In 2017, All-American Indian: This Fight Is Your Fight got released. This is about the battle to save America from those elite class people thinking that they know better.
Personal life:
Shiva Ayyadurai is widely known for his romantic life with the actress Fran Drescher. On September 7, 2014, he got married to Drescher. In a ceremony held at the Drescher’s beach house. They both twitted that they had married and it was not a formal wedding. It is just a gathering for friends and family members. But later in September 2016, they got split up.