#web-history

#web-history

When Sir Tim Berners-Lee invented the world wide web in 1989, his vision was clear: it would used by everyone, filled with everything and, crucially, it would be free. Today, the British computer scientist's creation is regularly used by 5.5 billion people and bears little resemblance to the democratic force for humanity he intended. In Australia to promote his book, This is for Everyone, Berners-Lee is reflecting on what his invention has become and how he and a community of collaborators can put the power of the web back into the hands of its users.

This Is for Everyone reads like a family newsletter: it tells you what happened, recounting the Internet's origin and evolution in great detail, but rarely explaining why the ideal of a decentralized Internet was not realized. Berners-Lee's central argument is that the web has strayed from its founding principles and been corrupted by profit-driven companies that seek to monetize our attention. But it's still possible to "fix the internet", he argues, outlining a utopian vision for how that might be done.