John P. Barlow ’69

John P. Barlow, 70, cyberlibertarian activist, cattle ranger and lyricist for the Grateful Dead, died Feb. 7, 2018. A member of Alpha Delta Phi, he received his degree with high honors from the College of Letters. After graduation he lived in India and New York before setting out for California, where he intended to tour with the Grateful Dead. On his way, he stopped at his family’s ranch in Wyoming and in the wake of his father suffering a massive stroke, he decided to stay. He would go on to practice animal husbandry for the next two decades, but remained in close collaboration with members of the Grateful Dead. Songs borne out of his collaboration include “Cassidy,” “Mexicali Blues,” “Black-Throated Wind,” and many more until the Dead disbanded in 1995. In 1990, he and two other cyber-activists founded the Electronic Frontier Foundation. In 1996 he published his futurist-philosophy manifesto that would become his seminal work: “A Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace,” which argued for sovereignty on the Internet after Congress had made its first major attempt to regulate pornographic material on the Internet. Throughout his life, he was a prolific writer and was a frequent collaborator for Wired, the New York Times, Nerve, and others. He documented his cyber-spatial journey to Africa in his Wiredpiece entitled “Africa Rising: Everything You Know About Africa Is Wrong.” In 2012, he co-founded the free-speech nonprofit, Freedom of the Press Foundation. Married twice, his first wife was Elaine Parker Barlow, with whom he had three daughters. His second wife, Cynthia Horner, died. He is also survived by a granddaughter.