@whereisciao recently pointed out this Making Things article by Caterina Fake co-founder of Hunch and Flickr. Her article discusses who inspires her and it is not so much who as what they accomplished.

Her article includes a quote from John Holt

Leaders are not what many people think–people with huge crowds following them. Leaders are people who go their own way without caring, or even looking to see whether anyone is following them. “Leadership qualities” are not the qualities that enable people to attract followers, but those that enable them to do without them...

 

She wrote a good article but it got me wanting to learn more about John Holt and homeschooling. He coined the word unschooling in 1977 to mean learning that does not look like school learning... His web site about Growing Without Schooling is interesting.