John Henry Thompson

John Henry Michael Thompson (born June 15, 1959), known among his peers as "J.T.", is a Jamaican-American software engineer that was the chief scientist of MacroMind and its successor, Macromedia.

Early life and education
Thompson was born to Jamaican laborers who frequently moved between cities for work. He credits his mother who "encouraged me to excel in school and taught me that education is a stepping-stone to financial and creative independence."

Thompson earned a degree in Computer Science and Visual Studies from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1983. His younger brother Jervis W. Thompson also pursued computer science and excelled as a student.

Career
In 1984, Thompson joined 's Droid Works, where he worked on, a pioneering.



MacroMind and Macromedia
Thompson and Erik Neumann are credited with creating the Lingo programming language that was used by Macromedia Director. Thompson's other projects included MacroMind VideoWorks II, VideoWorks Accelerator, MediaMaker, and Action!.