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November
10 , 2003, Vol. 74, No. 12F
Documentary in the works on the life and tragic death of a brilliant alum The talented young
alumnus Gene Kan (B.S. ’97 EECS), who was best known as a spokesman
for Gnutella peer-to-peer software and died tragically in 2002, is now
the subject of a film that began production this fall. Gone Silent, an
independent documentary, is the project of Vikki Merriman, a Boston-area
filmmaker and Web designer, and Sean Fitzroy, who will serve as technical
director and co-producer. Merriman was Kan’s housemate in Berkeley
in 1995. “I got the
idea for the film the day after I read about Gene’s death,”
Merriman says. “A friend forwarded me a story about it, not realizing
that I had known him.” She hopes the film will not only pay tribute
to Kan’s brilliance but also educate viewers about the promise
of peer-to-peer technology and the depressive and suicidal feelings
that often plague highly intelligent and successful people like Kan. A gifted programmer
who graduated from EECS in three-and-a-half years, Kan had a whirlwind
career with Gnutella, the controversial distributed search network he
helped develop, and InfraSearch, a real-time search engine he and his
colleagues subsequently created based on Gnutella-type technology. Comparable
to Napster but even more powerful, Gnutella was a free download that
enabled users to swap and search files outside a corporate or commercial
server setting. By the time he
was in his early 20s, Kan was thrust into the high-tech limelight. He
had earned wide respect in his field and was aggressively recruited
by Sun Microsystems, which ended up buying his 15-person start-up. He
testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee about music on the Internet
and was interviewed by National Public Radio and other mainstream media
on Gnutella and its implications for peer-to-peer technology. Despite these successes,
he suffered from depression and, on June 29, 2002, after writing notes
to family and friends, he took his own life. His sense of failure was
documented in the months leading up to his death in his writings and
online journals, which Merriman will use to help tell Kan’s story
in his own words. The film is sponsored by Boston Film and Video Foundation, and Merriman is seeking other sponsors as well as information about Kan. Production and release date will depend on the progress of research and funding, she says. For more details, go to the film’s Web site, www.gonesilent.org. A scholarship fund
is being established in Kan’s honor to support a student working
on innovative technologies. Written by Patti Meagher |
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