Walter Mossberg

Name at birth: Walter Stephen Mossberg

A self-described "anti-techie technology writer," Walt Mossberg writes the influential weekly column "Personal Techology" for The Wall Street Journal. Mossberg joined the newspaper in 1970 and covered national and international affairs as a reporter until launching the weekly column in 1991. Mossberg's enthusiasm for simplicity in computers, software, cell phones, and gadgets of all kinds has made him one of the most influential columnists in the wired world. Newsweek called him "a champion of the technology-befuddled everyman" in 1997, and Wired said in 2005, "Few reviewers have held so much power to shape an industry's successes and failures." Mossberg also has written for the magazine Smart Money and appeared as a regular commentator on CNBC and The Charlie Rose Show. Under the auspices of The Wall Street Journal, he and fellow columnist Kara Swisher oversee D: All Things Digital, an exclusive annual conference on technology. (The first D conference was held in 2003; subsequent conferences have been numbered as D2, D3, and so on.) Mossberg is the author of The Wall Street Journal Book of Personal Technology (1995).