Ian Hughes

Ian Hughes, also known as epredator, (born 30 or 31 August 1967 in Norfolk, England) is a British metaverse evangelist, technology industry analyst, and television personality. In 2006, he set about leading a group of like-minded individuals and subsequently many thousands of colleagues at IBM into virtual worlds like Second Life, and beyond. (Hughes' effort in Second Life, where he is known as Epredator Potato was documented extensively in a 2007 report.) This sparked a massive growth in interest from enterprises and press alike. Hughes was a public figure in Web 2.0 and, formerly, a blogger on Eightbar, a site maintained by former and current IBM employees on the fringes of innovation within their labs. Early years and career A self-described programmer since he was 14, Hughes attended Oriel Grammar School in Gorleston, Great Yarmouth, Norfolk, and De Montfort University (formerly Leicester Polytechnic) in Leicester, Leicestershire, where he received a BSc in Information Technology. Hughes is a former Consulting IT Specialist who worked on emerging technologies at IBM for 20 years. He is now an independent consultant under the business called Feeding Edge Ltd. As a gamer, he describes seeing a massive increase in the capability and design ethics within games and the rise of online gaming. In 1997, Hughes started working on the World Wide Web, changing his perspective on the science and technology and business due to the much richer mix of people involved in the web revolution. He told part of this story in a 2008 interview with Rita J. King on The Imagination Age, in which he described how in 1992 he was one of the earliest advocates of using PCs at IBM.