Computerworld and the larger tech journalism community lost an outstanding journalist and beloved colleague earlier this month with the unexpected passing of Senior Reporter Lucas Mearian. He passed away on Oct. 21 while recovering from heart surgery, leaving behind his wife Kim and their family.
After a nearly 10-year stint in the US Marine Corps and an early career in newspaper journalism, first as daily newspaper reporter and briefly as editor-in-chief at a local weekly paper, Lucas came to Computerworld in June 2000. He immediately began digging into enterprise technology topics with a dedication and curiosity that would successfully carry him through the next 25 years. Among the topics he wrote about — and won awards for — were enterprise storage, automotive technology, PCs, 3D printing, data privacy, fintech, cryptocurrency and blockchain. Most recently he focused on generative AI, the reshoring of chip manufacturing to the US, remote/hybrid work, and IT skills and training.
Lucas approached everything he did with enthusiasm, high energy, and a positive outlook. Where other reporters might see mundane topics, Lucas always saw opportunity. He was legendary at Computerworld for finding great stories on his data storage beat — a topic few expected would produce the number of compelling articles he regularly filed. He once found himself deep in a western Pennsylvania mine, 22 stories underground, that had been set up by data storage and management vendor Iron Mountain to study geothermal conditions and engineering designs for electronic document storage.
