Ilya Eric Lee

Ilya Eric Lee (李士傑 Li Shih-Chieh, 1973–2019) was a Taiwanese internet cultural activist and connector who stitched together open-culture networks across Taipei and the world. He played a crucial role in Wikimania 2007 in Taiwan, where several people met for the first time—including SCALE editors Jonathan Phillips and Christopher Adams, and where Christopher Adams met Joi Ito—a critical moment linking histories that would unfold for years afterward. When visitors came to Taiwan, Ilya met them, took them around, and connected the dots. A co-founder of Elixus with Autrijus Tang, he developed the Metalist syndication project and helped plan nettime-zh; he led NDAP work at Academia Sinica and served on Culturemondo's international steering committee. His practice extended to exhibitions such as Towards Mysterious Realities (2016); Kingdom of Piracy's PiraGene and PiraPort were revisited at Shu Lea Cheang's Lab Kill Lab (2020) in his memory. He died suddenly in 2019, far too young. SCALE celebrates him every year on his birthday, 18 June.