To the Editor:
Related to Lee Konstantinou’s essay on the influence of Tolkien’s work on the tech world, I have been maintaining a list for a couple years called Tech of the Rings. It’s an ever-growing collection of tech companies with names inspired by The Lord of the Rings and the Tolkien legendarium, from Palantir to Valinor. While many of these are names one might associate with the “good guys,” it is quite surprising that there are actually companies that have the names Sauron and Mordor. Perhaps they welcome the PR complexity associated with these names? Or are trying to hire from a heretofore unknown Orc talent pool? Or perhaps the founders are fans of a Russian novel I stumbled upon called The Last Ringbearer (full disclosure: I haven’t read it, only about it!) that seems to take a revisionist approach to Tolkien, viewing Mordor as actually a land of progress and technology and is the victim of propaganda? Either way, I certainly welcome additional submissions for this list.
– Samuel Arbesman is the author of the forthcoming book The Magic of Code and Scientist in Residence at Lux Capital.