Foster Provost in memoriam for Tom Fawcett, killed on June 4th in a freak bicycle accident. Tom was a brilliant scholar, a selfless collaborator, a substantial contributor to Data Science for three decades, and a unique individual.
My dear friend Tom Fawcett (1958 - 2020) was killed on June 4th in a freak bicycle accident. Tom was a brilliant scholar, a selfless collaborator, a substantial contributor to Data Science for three decades, and a unique individual.

Tom and I collaborated closely for much of my career. We started working together in 1994, when I joined what’s now Verizon (then NYNEX Science and Technology). My initial impression was that Tom was a curmudgeon (yes, even back then), and I had some doubts about what working with him would be like. Very soon I realized that beneath this impression he was a kind, thoughtful, caring guy, as well as a brilliant data scientist.

#foster provost #history #machine learning #tom fawcett