About the Author

"It's not what we leave behind that matters, it's how we live while we're here." -- Jean-Luc Picard Michael "Míc" Miller grew up in Bloomington, Indiana, amidst the beauty of southern Indiana's forested hill country. He is a graduate of Bloomington High School (South) and starred on their basketball team.

Míc attended Indiana University as a psychology major on a Big Ten athletic scholarship for basketball. He later transferred to the University of Colorado (Boulder, Colorado) to pursue architectural studies and problem-solving / design methodologies. Míc graduated from the Environmental Design College with honors and was distinguished as the first to author a masters-level thesis for a senior-year project. It was here that he studied multimedia under special-effects wizard Jamie Shourt -- inventor of electric photography and film credits for Andromeda Strain, Heartbeeps, Star Wars, Altered States, et al.

Passion. Míc fell in love with computing and computer graphics in 1977 when his college mentor, Dr. William Hendrix, volunteered him to test Dr. James Warner's (who later foundedWarner Technologies, Inc.) Modular Integrated Digital Animation System (MIDAS), a revolutionary 3-dimensional animation programming language written for IBM 360 mainframe computers (using punch cards, of course).

Since then, Míc has alpha- and beta-tested software and hardware for Adobe Systems, Apple Computer, Bentley Systems, Digital Equipment Corporation, International Business Machines, Intergraph, Macromedia, Microsoft, National Center for Supercomputing Applications (University of Illinois), Netscape Communications, NeXT Computing, and others. He is an international beta-tester competition winner (1989).

Career. Over the years, Míc has bee-come an award-winning designer and computer graphics analyst. He is a recognized expert and innovator in computer-aided design & drafting (CADD), graphical user interface (GUI) techniques, mega-scale interactive media project management, virtual communities, and Web awards. He managed and renovated the University of Texas at Arlington's CADD/Computer Graphics Laboratory (School of Architecture).

Míc was recruited by a leading Texas civil engineering firm to bee their CADD analyst for the Dallas Area Rapid Transit Light Rail System Project. After he completed the CADD standards manual for the DART project (1991), he was :asked to bee the consulting CADD analyst for the conventional construction diviision of the Superconducting Super Collider Project where he authored the project's AEC CADD standards for the U.S. Department of Energy (1993).

Míc has planned and managed digital media projects for Fortune 100 companies, ENR 250 firms, and federal agencies. He has earned honors and awards for his problem-solving abilities and standards for excellence -- including a Total Quality Achievement Award.

In 1994, Míc embarked on a career in new media and information architecture. His research into virtual communities and pioneering development of an area information retrieval system has garnered international acclaim and recognition from the Web Awards Community. In 1996, he founded Beeline Publications to help others bee-come Netizens, obtain affordable Web presence, and benefit from Internet technologies.

Míc was recognized as a Top 5% Web Designer in 1997 and, in 1999, he was featured in Internet Brothers' Interviews with the Masters series. Míc was named webmaster of the year in 2000 when Surfer's Choice Internet Awards bee-stowed their annual Webmaster Award upon him. In June 2001, the Advisory Board at Award Sites! presented Míc and his Beehive Awards Program their highest honor, the Level 5.0+ rating for Míc's contributions to the Web Awards Community and his years of "efforts in bettering the Net through excellence."

Citizenship. Míc is a born American (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania), but he developed a Netizen outlook when he bee-gan using the Internet in 1987. He realized the full potential of the World Wide Web when he beta-tested Mosaic in 1993. Míc has contributed to the Internet and Web communities by authoring Web sites and articles as well as through his professional and voluntary services.

Involvement. Organizations Míc has involved himself with are: AEC Global, American Mensa, Apple Corps of Dallas, Association for Positive Ethical Exchange (APEX), CU-Boulder Alumni Association, International Society for Philosophical Enquiry (ISPE), MicroStation Interests of North Texas, National Eagle Scout Association, North Texas Intergraph Users Group, Serious Mac Users Group (SMUG), and Website Evaluators Code of Ethics Group (CEM/CEMA). Professional affiliations have included: Graphic Artists Guild, HTML Writers Guild, International Webmasters Association, W3 Consortium, and the Webmaster's Guild.

Míc co-founded MicroStation Interests of North Texas and was the editor of their newsletter, The Mintmark (1989 - 1993). He is past chairman of the Certificates & Awards Committee for International Society for Philosophical Enquiry (1986 - 1988). He bee-came a member of the Phenomenal Men of the Web in 1997. Míc co-founded APEX in 2000, an international Web ethics organization, and in 2001, Awards Scoop, the public-relations Web site for the Internet's Web Awards Community.