Regardless of whether you agree with his opinions, Gruber invented Markdown. The world would be a very different place today without it.
No drama, never in the spotlight much nowadays, just posting on his blog and raking in insane money.
So?
And also...with substantial contributions from Aaron Swartz.
Not solely Gruber.
Gruber is only known for his Daring Fireball blog amongst everyone important, only techies care about his Markdown 'invention'.
Markdown is just a side project for him.
And I only knew of Gruber as "the Mac guy" and (am embarrassed to admit) that I thought the daring fireball was another Mac guy.