Tim Wu

Tim Wu is the Julius Silver Professor of Law, Science and Technology at Columbia Law School. Widely known for coining the term net neutrality in 2002 and championing the equal access to the Internet, Professor Wu teaches about teaches antitrust, copyright, the media industries, and communications law, and his writing addresses private power, free speech, and information warfare.

In his most recent book, The Curse of Bigness: Antitrust in the New Gilded Age (2018), Professor Wu argues that corporate and industrial concentration can lead to the rise of populism, nationalism, and extremist politicians. His previous books include The Attention Merchants: The Epic Scramble to Get Inside Our Heads (2016), The Master Switch: The Rise and Fall of Information Empires (2010), and Who Controls the Internet? Illusions of a Borderless World (2006), which he co-authored with Jack Goldsmith. Professor Wu is a contributing opinion writer for The New York Times and also has written for Slate, The New Yorker, and The Washington Post. He has been named one of America’s 100 most influential lawyers by the National Law Journal; has made Politico’s list of 50 most influential figures in American politics (more than once), and has been included in the Scientific American 50 of policy leadership.

Professor Wu is currently on leave serving in the federal government. In March 2021, he was appointed to the National Economic Council as a special assistant to the president for technology and competition policy.

Professor Wu was a special advisor for the White House National Economic Council (2016-2017), and served as Senior Advisor with the Federal Trade Commission from 2011-2012. He has previously worked for the New York Attorney General, and in the Silicon Valley telecommunications industry. Professor Wu was a law clerk for Justice Stephen Breyer and Judge Richard Posner.