Matthew K Gray
matthew@gray.org

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• About me

In 1994 I left MIT to start a company, net.Genesis. They do server side software tools for web developers. In 1996, I returned to MIT to complete my degree.

After completing graduate school, I came to work for Virtual Ink, makers of mimio, one of the coolest products you'll ever see. In early 2001, I left Virtual Ink to start another company, Newbury Networks.

In the past, I've had a few areas of professional focus, including my graduate work in distributed systems, code mobility and related applications of multivariate analysis.

In school, I was at the MIT Media Lab, in the Personal Information Architecture Group and the Physics and Media group. They do some of the coolest, strangest stuff of any research lab I've ever known. The focus of my work was distributed systems applied to ubiquitous computing. Previous work include high-dimensional machine inference, and a project called PAN, which deals with intrabody signaling through low intensity electrostatic fields.

In another life, I was very involved in the web as a technology. In fact, I wrote a book. Build a Web Site. It came out in 1995, so it's a bit out of date now, but much less so than you would guess. It is meant to be a very good web technical manual. The publishers chose the title. You can buy it at amazon.com. You can probably also find a copy via half.com or the like.

My research on web growth has indefinitely halted. The comprehensive list is indefinitely unavailable. Also, see the most recent report on the growth of the web.

German Board Games

Several years ago, I discovered this entire genre of games that are engaging, play in a reasonably short time, are beatufully designed, and are a lot of fun.

Statistics

I do a lot of math for my work, but part of the reason for that is that I really enjoy statistics, in particular statistical algorithms and the general field of multivariate analysis.

Physics

This was my undergraduate major, but since I don't do it as my primary research anymore, this is more of a 'personal interest'. My research interests have included particle physics (particularly flavor changing color currents in K+ decays), and astrophysics (particularly gravitational lenses, Koronis group asteroids, and image analysis)

Reading (fiction, mostly)

I used to read a lot. Then I stopped. Then I realized how much I missed reading and have started again, then I stopped again. So, I switch back and forth. When I'm in a reading mode, I typically read about a book a week. Mostly science fiction, because it is easy to get a hold of at MIT. The author I most recommend is Timothy Zahn. A lot of his books are out of print, but you can get his Conqueror's series and his Star Wars series. I'm not usually fond of books based on movies and the like, but I make an exception for Timothy Zahn. I'd also recommend almost anything by Niven. Specifically: Lucifer's Hammer, The Integral Trees, The Mote in God's Eye, and of course Ringworld.

Computers

I write a lot of code, especially in perl and java. A lot (hundreds that I've saved). I consider myself a very proficient perl and java programmer, but don't hold it against me.

I don't mind getting random personal email, so feel free to send me mail.