If there is one person we need to thank for being able to communicate the way that we do, this of course is Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the World Wide Web. Moreover, the significance of inventions exceeds that of their technical aspects, however ground-breaking the latter may be. Technology is not a neutral domain, but a social product, bearing political and cultural significations. And the invention of the World Wide Web is inseparable from the politics of an open and participatory internet culture. As James Curran argues, Tim Berners-Lee placed a public service ethic above market values, and rather than promoting his work through a private company, the World Wide Web code was released as a free gift to the community (James Curran and Jean Seaton, Power without responsibility, the press, broadcasting, and new media in Britain, 7th edition, London: Routledge, 2010, pp. 262-263).
Tim Berners-Lee is sometimes asked if he is upset about not making a lot of money from the web, and he has a quite interesting reply on the matter (Weaving the web: the original design and ultimate destiny of the World Wide Web by its inventor, London: Orion, 2000, p. 116):
What is maddening is the terrible notion that a person's value depends on how important and financially successful they are, and that this is measured in terms of money [...] Core in my upbringing was a value system that put monetary gain well in its place.
So thank you, Tim Berners-Lee.
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