Omar Wasow

Omar Tomas Wasow (born 1970 in Nairobi, Kenya) is an internet analyst who appears frequently on radio and television. Wasow tutored Oprah Winfrey in her first exploration of the Net in the 12-part series Oprah Goes Online. He is co-founder and strategic advisor for the social networking website BlackPlanet. He is currently Assistant Professor of Politics at Princeton University. Wasow's mother is African-American. Wasow's paternal grandfather was the mathematician Wolfgang R. Wasow. Both Wolfgang Wasow and Omar Wasow's paternal grandmother are of German Jewish heritage.

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In 1995, Wasow was proclaimed by Newsweek as one of the "fifty most influential people to watch in cyberspace." Around 1999 or 2000, Wasow introduced Oprah Winfrey to electronic mail in a series of 12 appearances on her television show.

In 1999 he created Blackplanet, one of the first major social networking sites.

In 2003, Wasow appeared in an Apple, Inc advertisement discussing their latest operating system at the time Mac OS X Panther. In 2010 Wasow appeared as a guest on Stephen Colbert's show as a guest to explain cyberwar.

Wasow is a graduate of Stuyvesant High School in New York City, where he was President of the Student Union. He then graduated from Stanford University in California with a BA degree in Race and Ethnic Relations.

Wasow earned a PhD in African-American Studies, an MA in Government and an MA in Statistics all from Harvard University. Wasow is currently Assistant Professor of Politics at Princeton University.