Mike O’Connor

Retired

I became moderately famous in Minnesota as the co-founder of an ISP called Gofast.net and one of the people who popularized the Internet back in the mid-90’s.  I’m also one of the geeks who registered a few one-word domain names (who knew where that would wind up) and got involved with ICANN as a result.  These days I help Marcie restore 500 acres of Driftless Area habitat in Wisconsin (Prairie Haven).  During the COVID years, I helped musicians rehearse, perform and produce over the Internet (Pretty Good Jacktrip and related stuff – see Tools).

My background tended toward managing large-scale technology projects and leading non-profit sector development efforts. A few highlights include: starting a community radio station (WORT-FM – Madison, WI), co-founding the National Federation of Community Broadcasters (NFCB), successfully opposing “frac sand” mining in in our Wisconsin county (FracSandFrisbee), doing cool complicated projects as a Managing Associate at what is now called PwC, and falling in love with that “Internet” thing as Associate Vice President of Finance (and Controller for a little while) at the University of Minnesota.

I graduated from Grinnell College with a Bachelors Degree in Economics, and received a Masters in Business Administration from the Johnson Graduate School of Management at Cornell University.