Andrew Lee | |
---|---|
Head of the House of Yi (disputed) | |
Reign | 2021 – present |
Predecessor | Yi Seok |
Ruler of the Joseon Cybernation | |
Reign | 2023 – present |
Born | Indianapolis, Indiana, United States |
Spouse | Nana Lee |
House | House of Yi |
URL | www |
Andrew Lee (born December 1983) [1] is an entrepreneur and the founder of the VPN service Private Internet Access, which started in 2010. Lee is, in media, known as "Crown Prince of Korea", as a pretender to the defunct throne of Joseon and the Korean Empire after being adopted by Yi Seok, a grandson of Emperor Gojong of Korea.
Andrew Lee | |
Hangul | |
---|---|
Revised Romanization | Ri Aendeuryu |
McCune–Reischauer | Ri Aendŭryu |
Alternate name (presumably after joining the royal family) | |
Hangul | 이앤드루 [5] |
In 2009,Lee founded London Trust Media (LTM),a private holdings company. In 2010,he founded Private Internet Access (PIA),a virtual private network service for anonymizing Internet traffic. [6] He claimed to have started PIA because of his interest in Internet Relay Chat (IRC),whose users' IP addresses could be easily revealed,but only after the Freenode purchase. [7] Lee and co-owner Steve DeProspero sold LTM (and its subsidiary PIA) to Israeli company Kape Technologies for US$95.5 million in November 2019. [8] [9] Lee co-founded Mt. Gox Live,a bitcoin price tracker that was later acquired by the now-defunct bitcoin exchange Mt. Gox. [10]
In 2017,Christel Dahlskjaer,then the head of staff at Freenode,incorporated and transferred ownership of Freenode Limited to Lee; [11] Dahlskjaer and Lee said the company was solely for funding the network and running the Freenode #live conferences. [12] [13] According to staff,they were not informed of the contents of the deal and were told that it would not affect Freenode's day-to-day operations,as the company only managed the conference and nothing else. [13] [14] A dispute over changes Lee imposed in 2021 resulted in all of Freenode's 20 to 30 staff members resigning. [12] [13] This team went on to form a new network called Libera Chat. [12]
According to Andrew Lee,Won Joon Lee,one of his distant relatives and grandson of a keeper of the House of Yi lineage,said that their clan was descended from Korean royalty;as the result,he was introduced to Yi Seok,a grandson of Emperor Gojong of Korea. Yi Seok is known as an active pretender to the former monarchy,but he has no male offspring,and he proposed adopting Andrew Lee as his heir. [15] In October 2018,Yi Seok declared Lee the crown prince of Korea at a ceremony in Los Angeles,attended by Bermuda premier David Burt,and city officials from Los Angeles and Jeonju. [16] [17] [18] Andrew Lee later took over Yi Seok’s status as the claimant to the Joseon throne in 2022. By March 2022,Lee announced the founding of a "non-territorial successor state to the Joseon Empire",a cloud-based,blockchain-backed kingdom with himself as its ruler. In June 2023,the government of Antigua and Barbuda released a statement establishing diplomatic relations with the "Joseon Cybernation". [15] [19] [20]
Andrew Lee was born in Indianapolis and raised in Carmel,a city in the Indianapolis metro area. [21] [22] He enrolled in Purdue University and transferred to the University at Buffalo,but later dropped out to start working. [22]
In 2020,Lee and his family moved to a mansion in Hidden Valley,Ventura County,California. [21] [23]
In the afternoon of 18 November,2022,J-Money,driving a Rolls-Royce Phantom registered to Andrew Lee,was shot and robbed by 2 men in Koreatown,Los Angeles. [24] [25] [26] As of February 2023,the perpetrators have not been identified. [27] Andrew Lee,under the rapper name KingLee,appeared on J-Money's album titled "Dun It All". [28]
Lee,I,or Yi (이) is the second-most-common surname in Korea,behind Kim (김). As of the South Korean census of 2015,there were 7,306,828 people by this name in South Korea or 14.7% of the population.
Taejong,personal name Yi Bang-won,was the third monarch of the Joseon dynasty of Korea and the father of Sejong the Great. He was the fifth son of King Taejo,the founder of the dynasty. Before ascending to the throne,he was known as Prince Jeongan.
Yi Seok is a South Korean entrepreneur. He is a member of the House of Yi,the royal house of Joseon and Korean Empire. He is the 10th son of Prince Yi Kang,the fifth son of Emperor Gojong,and one of his consorts,Lady Hong Chŏng-sun.
Yi Kang,Prince Imperial Ui,also known as Prince Uihwa(1891-1900) or King Ui(1900-1955) was the second son of Emperor Gojong of Korea and his concubine,Lady Jang,who was a court lady-in-waiting.
Yi Won is a great-grandson of Gojong of Korea and one of several who claim to be current head of the House of Yi.
The House of Yi,also called the Yi dynasty,was the royal family of the Joseon dynasty and later the imperial family of the Korean Empire,descended from the Joseon founder Yi Seong-gye. All of his descendants are members of the Jeonju Yi clan.
Gongyang was the 34th and final ruler of the Goryeo Dynasty of Korea. He was the descendant of Duke Yangyang,brother of King Huijong. He was deposed by Yi Seong-gye,who then established the new Joseon.
Yi Hae-won,also Lee Hae-won,was a member of the House of Yi,the royal family of Joseon and the Korean Empire. Yi was considered a pretender to the throne until her death at the age of 100 in her house in Hanam,Gyeonggi Province.
Crown Prince Sohyeon was the first son of King Injo of Joseon Dynasty.
Freenode,stylized as freenode and formerly known as Open Projects Network,is an IRC network which was previously used to discuss peer-directed projects. Their servers are accessible from the hostname chat.freenode.net,which load balances connections by using round-robin DNS.
The King's Doctor is a 2012 South Korean television series depicting Baek Gwang-hyeon (1625–1697),Joseon Dynasty veterinarian,starring Cho Seung-woo and Lee Yo-won. It aired on MBC from October 1,2012 to March 25,2013 on Mondays and Tuesdays at 21:55 for 50 episodes. The historical/period epic drama commemorated MBC's 51st anniversary.
Mt. Gox was a bitcoin exchange based in Shibuya,Tokyo,Japan. Launched in 2010,it was handling over 70% of all bitcoin transactions worldwide by early 2014,when it abruptly ceased operations amid revelations of its involvement in the loss/theft of hundreds of thousands of bitcoins,then worth hundreds of millions in US dollars.
Private Internet Access (PIA) is a personal VPN service that allows users to connect to multiple locations. In 2018,former Mt. Gox CEO Mark Karpelès was named chief technology officer of PIA's parent company,London Trust Media. In November 2019,Private Internet Access was acquired by UK-based Kape Technologies.
Six Flying Dragons is a South Korean television series starring Yoo Ah-in,Kim Myung-min,Shin Se-kyung,Byun Yo-han,Yoon Kyun-sang and Chun Ho-jin. It aired on SBS on Mondays and Tuesdays at 22:00 for 50 episodes beginning on October 5,2015,as part of SBS 25th anniversary special. The drama serves as a loose prequel to Deep Rooted Tree.
The Jeonju Yi clan is a Korean clan with the surname Yi. Their bon-gwan is in Jeonju,North Jeolla Province. The clan includes the House of Yi that led Joseon and the Korean Empire.
100 Days My Prince is a 2018 South Korean television series starring Doh Kyung-soo and Nam Ji-hyun. The series aired on tvN from September 10 to October 30,2018,every Monday and Tuesday at 21:30 (KST). It is one of the highest-rated Korean dramas in cable television history.
Libera Chat,stylized as Libera.Chat,is an IRC network for free and open-source software projects. It was founded on 19 May 2021 by former Freenode staff members,after Freenode was taken over by Andrew Lee,founder of Private Internet Access.
Yi Hwa (1348–1408) or Grand Prince Uian,was a warrior and scholar in the late Goryeo period who became part of the early Joseon dynasty royal family as the fourth son of Yi Cha-ch'un,making him a younger half-brother to Yi Sŏng-gye,its founder.
The King of Tears,Lee Bang-won is a South Korean television series starring Joo Sang-wook in the title role. With this series,KBS revived its historical drama series after 5 years,as the last KBS historical series Jang Yeong-sil was aired in 2016. It depicts the story of Yi Bang-won,the third king of Joseon,from a new perspective. It premiered on KBS1 on December 11,2021,and aired on Saturdays and Sundays at 21:40 (KST) till May 1,2022.
Noryang:Deadly Sea is a 2023 South Korean historical war action film directed by Kim Han-min. The sequel to 2022's Hansan:Rising Dragon,the film is the third and final installment in the Yi Sun-sin trilogy. It stars an ensemble cast led by Kim Yoon-seok as the Korean naval commander Yi Sun-sin. The film depicts the historical Battle of Noryang,the last major battle of the Japanese invasions of Korea (1592–1598). It was released theatrically on December 20,2023.