Craig Winn

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Craig Winn is an American author who has self-published several books on terrorism and Islam. In the 1990s he was a Dot.com entrepreneur whose online mall Value America raised investments from Microsoft and Federal Express.[1], but went bankrupt within a year of its IPO and was deemed the first "dot bomb".

After the events of September 11th, Winn began a research project with colleague Kevin Power to "uncover the roots of terrorism". They visited 120 countries and interviewed members of al-Qaeda, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Fatah, Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, Force 17, the Palestinian Authority, the Knesset, IDF, and US generals, as well as Israeli secret service agents in the Mossad and Shin Bet. The two published their findings in the novel Tea With Terrorists.[2]

Winn has been interviewed in Business Week[3], and has been a guest on many radio shows in the U.S.[4].

Contents

[edit] Business career

In 1977 Craig joined his father's company, Winn Co., after graduating from the University of Southern California with business degrees in marketing and finance. There he worked as a manufacturer's representative.[1] In 1986, he founded and built a lighting company called Dynasty, which he brought public in 1990, and which went bankrupt in 1993.[1] In 1996, he founded Value America, an early sort of electronic mall that was briefly second only to Amazon.com. The company had a successful IPO in early 1999 but failed within a year.[1] Winn's share of Value America was, on paper, worth over $1 billion after the company's IPO, and he planned to use his new wealth to bankroll a political career, including a run for the presidency of the United States.[2] These plans were shelved when Value America imploded a few months later.

[edit] Published works

His first book is titled Tea With Terrorists, co-written with Ken Power. In this book, they document an investigation of the motives of terrorists. Winn has also authored Prophet of Doom, which is a survey of Muhammad's life as derived from the Qur'an and Hadith. Other works of his are In The Company of Good & Evil (also written with Ken Power), Future History and Yada Yahweh. He has published these books through the Cricketsong Books imprint, a division of Virginia Publishers, which is in turn a wholly owned subsidiary of The Winn Company, LLC.[3]

[edit] Thesis

According to Prophet of Doom and Tea With Terrorists, Islamic terrorists are inspired by the actions of Muhammad and the verses in the Qu'ran. Winn carefully documents this thesis in his topical examination of the Islamic scriptures which he uses as the foundation of this conclusion.

He claims to have compiled the verses of the Qur'an in Chronological order with the use of Hadith.

Winn worked with his team of researchers to compile an extensive timeline of Islamic terrorism.[5],[6]

[edit] Muslim reponse

Winn's work has not been well received in the Muslim community, and some have circulated a petition to have one of his books banned and censored.[7]

Winn claims to have documented attempts of "Muslims filing complaints with the domain registrar to release private information" regarding his location and their repeated attempts to hijack the site [8].

Middle East scholar Daniel Pipes had written that the censorious muslim response to Winn's books raises important concerns regarding freedom of speech and the press. [9].

CAIR has accused Winn of "hatemongering and fomenting incitement for the purpose of cashing in on fear and ignorance."[4]

[edit] Television and Radio guest appearances

Winn claims to have conducted over 1500 radio interviews[10]. Some of the shows are made available on his website.[11]

[edit] Bibliography

[edit] References

  1. ^ a b c "Craig Winn, Netrepreneur," Businessweek 2000 article
  2. ^ dot.bomb: My Days and Nights at an Internet Goliath. J. David Kuo, 2001
  3. ^ Ken Power. Copyright information on sources used on FutureTruth.net. Retrieved on 2006-09-23.
  4. ^ Muhammad Sultan "Anti-Islamic Ravings Are Shameful", May 4, 2006

[edit] External links

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