Italy was on Tuesday mourning the
anti-establishment 5-Star Movement (M5S)'s "visionary" founder
Gianroberto Casaleggio, who has died aged 61.
The entrepreneur, mass media specialist, Internet expert
and atypical politician from Milan began his career with
Olivetti in the 1970s before creating the joint venture
communications consultancy Webegg.
In 2004 he established his Casaleggio Associates and
started to take an interest in politics.
He met Genoa comedian Beppe Grillo after a show the
following year and suggested they work together, creating
Grillo's hugely popular blog that would go on to become the
on-line platform for the movement.
This also marked the start of Grillo's political ascent.
In 2007 Casaleggio Associates produced the videos
"Prometheus - The media revolution" and "Gaia", a vision of the
future in which traditional media have disappeared and the world
is governed by Web-based intelligence.
The films contributed to creating his aura of mystery and
to accusations that he belonged to the esoteric freemasonry - a
claim he repeatedly denied.
Casaleggio and Grillo founded M5S in 2009 and the party
went on to take 109 seats in the Lower House and 59 in the
Senate in 2013 elections.
With a few rare exceptions he kept out of the limelight,
letting Grillo be the movement's front man.
He took to the stage in Rome's Piazza San Giovanni for the
close of the European Parliament election campaign in 2014 and
again for the '5-Star Party' at Circo Massimo.
His friend Grillo was always by his side.
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