The man in the middle of the vast stadium pressed a button on a boxy old computer terminal, causing a message to flash across the darkness in front of a billion viewers scattered all over the world. This is for everyone, it said.
This was Sir Tim Berners-Lee, who helped create the World Wide Web and then surrendered control of it. The act, staged at the centre of the extravagant opening ceremony of the London Olympic Games, showed how his invention triggered a digital revolution as important as preceding scenes of industrial and social upheaval.
More than two decades after his breakthrough, the future of this digital world is the subject of intense debate to determine whether it really will be for everyone.
In December, the UN World Conference on International Telecommunications in Dubai will set out a broad framework of regulations for the internet – the global network of networks that links more than 2bn people, is gaining more than 500,000 users daily, and is the platform on which the web was founded. But the meeting’s goals are causing alarm.
Technically, the conference focuses on international agreements governing telecommunications, but some proposals stretch further than many want into internet governance.
more
The internet: Command and control - FT.com
This was Sir Tim Berners-Lee, who helped create the World Wide Web and then surrendered control of it. The act, staged at the centre of the extravagant opening ceremony of the London Olympic Games, showed how his invention triggered a digital revolution as important as preceding scenes of industrial and social upheaval.
More than two decades after his breakthrough, the future of this digital world is the subject of intense debate to determine whether it really will be for everyone.
In December, the UN World Conference on International Telecommunications in Dubai will set out a broad framework of regulations for the internet – the global network of networks that links more than 2bn people, is gaining more than 500,000 users daily, and is the platform on which the web was founded. But the meeting’s goals are causing alarm.
Technically, the conference focuses on international agreements governing telecommunications, but some proposals stretch further than many want into internet governance.
more
The internet: Command and control - FT.com