The 31 Most Important LGBT People In Tech

In a perfect world, it really shouldn't matter what sexual orientation successful people are.

But given that young LGBT people throughout the world still experience bullying at school, we think it's important to highlight some of the brightest LGBT talents in the tech industry.

'The general idea of corporate America taking on gay issues - with tech companies being out in front - has had an important influence on public opinion,' law professor Gary Gates of the University of California at Los Angeles, one of the country's top scholars on gay rights and demography, told Politico earlier this year. 'They have been first movers on anti-discrimination, on relationship recognition and now on most of the transgender issues.'

Companies like Twitter, Google, Microsoft, Apple, Facebook and IBM all have adopted LGBT benefits. Google, for example, has provided LGBT partner benefits since 2010. Twitter also has similar anti-discrimination policies in place and domestic-partner benefits in place since the very beginning.

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