Marc Canter

Marc Canter is an American internet entrepreneur, speaker, technology evangelist and early pioneer of online software, Canter recalls marching with Martin Luther King Jr. and being heavily involved in Chicago political campaigns as a child.

Career After college, Canter travelled to New York City to help his friends build a music studio called "Noise New York." During this time Canter learned about laserdiscs, laser light shows, NAPLPS, pro audio and video equipment, and a then-new technology called videodiscs. Canter has also worked as a taxi driver.

Canter co-founded MacroMind in 1984, the company that later became Macromedia, and began developing for the newly launched Apple Macintosh. Canter launched MacroMind with the idea of it being a "software rock and roll band", In the 1990s, he was the chairman of virtual technology company Canter Technology.

At MacroMind, Canter was involved in one of the first known cases of a virus being distributed via commercial software. According to the March 16, 1988 edition of the Toronto Star, several MacroMind products shipped with virus infected media. Analysis later revealed that Canter's computer was infected with the virus while he was working on training material for the software products. MacroMind and Canter moved to San Francisco, California, where the company received venture capital funding and was the third software-related investment of the firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. It was designed to be a waterhole for shared music experiences.

In the 1990s and 2000s, Canter was involved in various startups in the formulative stages of product development and design. He was an early participant in Tribe.net and helped develop its "tribes" system, and early social network 'groups' technology. He consulted for Ruckus Network and Visual Media . Broadband Mechanics has also collaborated with Avid Technology.

Canter and J. D. Lasica founded a video sharing website, Ourmedia in March 2005. Canter was founder and CEO of Broadband Mechanics, a digital lifestyle aggregator (DLA) company. Broadband Mechanics built tools and environments, including "People Aggregator", to enable online communities.

Burnt out on venture-funded companies, and described as having burned all of his bridges in Silicon Valley, The company was later renamed Interface.

In 2015, Canter, along with four other executives, cofounded Cola, a company that launched a messaging application designed to serve as a platform for messaging-based mobile applications. Canter described the company as "Slack for the rest of us."

In 2017, Canter co-founded Instigate, an AI company that is a new way for Creators to tell stories with interactive features and real engagement. Instigate is available as a download. Canter is the CEO of Instigate based in Silicon Valley.

Internet policy and culture Canter is a contributor to many open standards efforts and advocates for end-user controlled digital identities and content - being a co-founder of the "Identity Gang", and a co-signer of the Social Web Users' Bill of Rights. He has consulted with global corporations including PCCW and Intel and has written on the multimedia industry, micro-content publishing and social networking.