In a SPIEGEL interview, William Dutton of the Oxford Internet Institute discusses how fundamentally the World Wide Web has changed our lives since its creation 20 years ago, offering his views on how it helps communities organize and its emergence as a ‘Fifth Estate,’ helping hold both governments and media around the globe accountable.
SPIEGEL: Professor Dutton, do you happen to remember what you were doing on Aug. 6, 1991?
Dutton: I have no idea. It’s very interesting that the invention of the World Wide Web was not an earth-shaking event. It was definitely not like the Kennedy assassination.
SPIEGEL: On that Aug. 6, Tim Berners-Lee, creator of the World Wide Web, made his invention accessible to the Internet community. He did so in a discussion forum called alt.hypertext …
Dutton: … and probably not even Berners-Lee himself anticipated the viral spread of the standards he created.
Categories: Internet, Science and Technology