Engineer Willis Ware dies at 93

Willis Ware, an engineer who predicted the rise of personal computers, has died at his home in Santa Monica, California, his family said. He was 93. Ware, who worked as an engineer at Rand Corp. for more than 50 years, had been in failing health before he died Nov. 22, said his daughter, Alison Ware, the Los Angeles Times reported. Ware predicted in the mid-1960s personal computers -- as well as social networks like Twitter and Facebook -- would become popular. "The computer will touch men everywhere and in every way, almost on a minute-to-minute basis," he wrote in a paper presented at Rand 47 years ago. "Every man will communicate through a computer whatever he does. It will change and reshape his life, modify his career and force him to accept a life of continuous change." "Willis helped usher Rand into the computer era at a time when computers existed mostly in the realm of science fiction," Rand Chief Executive Michael Rich said in a statement. "He was ahead of his time in thinking about the profound effects that computers could have on information privacy."