Tim O'Reilly (born 1954) is the founder of O'Reilly Media (formerly O'Reilly & Associates) and a supporter of the free software and open source movements.
Born in County Cork, Ireland, O'Reilly moved to California with his family at six weeks of age.
Tim was initially interested in literature upon graduating from high school, but after graduating from Harvard College in 1975 with a B.A. cum laude in Classics he became involved in the field of computer user manuals. He defines his company not as a book or online publisher, nor as a conference producer (though the company does all three), but as a technology transfer company, 'changing the world by spreading the knowledge of innovators.' O'Reilly is on the board of CollabNet, and was on the board of Macromedia until its 2005 merger with Adobe Systems.
Tim is an activist for open source and open standards, and an opponent of software patents and other incursions of new intellectual property laws into the public domain. Tim's long term vision for his company is to help change the world by capturing and transmitting the knowledge of innovators.