Article here. Excerpt:
'Guido van Rossum is one of the world’s most influential programmers. Van Rossum is the author of the general-purpose programming language Python, which he started working on in 1989, and is now among the most popular languages in use. According to a survey of users on Stack Overflow, a popular question-and-answer site for programmers, Python is the fastest-growing major programming language, and the most used after JavaScript. Python is free and open source, meaning anybody can use the language and modify it to suit their specific needs.
In addition to creating the language, van Rossum has overseen its development. Programming languages evolve over time, with changes made to add features and fix bugs. Modifications to the official version, generally suggested by active users of the language, go through a complex approval process managed by a founder or core development team. Van Rossum served as the “benevolent dictator for life” of Python’s development until last year, when he stepped down from the post.
...
Van Rossum believes that the different attitudes of women and men in programming communities is due to wider societal problems that we need to fix from the bottom up. “I’ve always felt that feminism was right and we need to change the whole society,” he said. In the meantime, he feels a responsibility to act in the places he has influence, like in the Python community.'
