Jacques Vallée

Biographical Information
Jacques Fabrice Vallée (born September 24, 1939 in Pontoise, Val-d'Oise, France) is a venture capitalist, computer scientist, author, ufologist and former astronomer currently residing in San Francisco, California. In mainstream science, Vallée is notable for co-developing the first computerized mapping of Mars for NASA and for his work at SRI International in creating ARPANET, a precursor to the modern Internet. wiki

"Born in France, he was trained in astrophysics, and is a former principal investigator on computer networking projects for the Department of Defense. He first became interested in the UFO problem in 1961 while working on the staff of the French Space Committee, where he witnessed the destruction of tracking tapes of unknown objects. The following year, Vallee came to the United States and began working closely with Dr. J. Allen Hynek, the Air Force scientific consultant on the UFO problem.

"Dr. Vallee is widely recognized as the premier investigative scientist in the realm of UFO research today. In addition to authoring numerous articles and books, Vallee served as Steven Spielberg's advisor during the making of "Close Encounters of the Third Kind," and was the real-life model for the character portrayed by Francois Truffaut."

"He went on to work at SRI International and the Institute for the Future, where he directed the project to build the world's first network-based groupware system as a Principal Investigator on Arpanet, the prototype for the Internet." 

He wrote the foreword for John B. Alexander's 2011 book.