Ian McCarthy

When the opportunity emerged to join the team at The Planetary Society, Ian was amazed at his luck that he’d get to contribute to a mission that has long been meaningful and relevant to him.

Ian grew up in the Pasadena-area in the 90's — on a steady diet of PBS (in the Bill Nye era), Star Trek, and even a few Planetary Society magazines & events from time-to-time. As a little kid, he spent a non-trivial amount of time wondering about wormholes and if we could feasibly send our garbage past orbit to be blown up. And he vividly remembers one of his grade school teachers getting his class excited about Pathfinder and Sojourner landing on Mars.

His continued path through his education and early career was driven by an insatiable curiosity of how humans engage with systems (from the ecological to the technological). Over time, he focused this path into deep expertise of making people-databases work for different groups of people, consulting clients across various industries as a CRM systems implementer and integrator. He is honored that he now leverages his abilities with Salesforce CRM, various web technologies, and data architecture to connect people looking to find their place in space.

Ian also loves his kids, animals, and making music. When the workday is done, he still finds joy continuing to experiment with systems integration in electronic music production (like getting video game controllers to play synthesizers and drum machines).