John C. Dvorak, a pioneering technology journalist, podcaster, and cultural commentator, passed away peacefully on the morning of Monday, July 20, 2026. He was 80 years old. For tech journalists of a certain age, there was a time when everyone knew him.
@sjvn Was on one of his TechTV panels one time. During a commercial he said the panel needed to be more disagreeable because agreeable was boring. He was right.
@sjvn @briankrebs there was no better curmudgeon for the people. #RIP
@sjvn Oh wow, I used to read a lot of his stuff back in the day.
@sjvn I liked his back and forth with Leo
Laporte.
@sjvn RIP John, I remember coming home from school in the late 90s to watch Silicon Spin on ZDTV and reading your opinion pieces in PC Magazine. Always remember you gushing over the Apple G4 Cube and how perfect it was gonna be for you and your spouse.
@sjvn I read his stuff for ages. So many hours of enjoyment. He will be missed. We are not likely to see his kind again. 😢
@sjvn Knew him indirectly (emailed back and forth a few times). He'd "correct me" when I'd poke at him over Linux stuff. He will be missed.
@sjvn oh this is just horrible news 😥. RIP
@sjvn The best ever clip of John was him taking apart an IBM PS/2 on Computer Chronicles and then not knowing how to put it back together (10:55): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yoAH1aHmwR0
@sjvn Oh, crap. I used to work tangentially with him, at TechTV it must be. He was the BMOC when I was coming up, a wee slip of a girl in the industry just about to blow up. I enjoyed his work. Safe home, John. 🥀
@sjvn presumably he will carry on getting no spam in heaven
He gave me the idea to approach writing my book in bite-sized chunks.
In an episode of "Cranky Geeks" he said "Hell, write 200 words a day and in a year you have a novel."
Though I never met the man, I did stand next to him while waiting for a cab outside a hotel once.
@sjvn I haven’t followed him for a long time but TechTV was transformative for me and I watched him a ton on Silicon Spin and TwiT. RIP.