Web inventor calls for unity to stop misuse

Tim Berners-Lee says it would be defeatist to think that the web, now celebrating its 30th anniversary, cannot be changed for the better, writes Martyn Landi

Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the world wide web, has called on the public and politicians to “come together” to end its misuse in a letter to mark the technology’s 30th anniversary.

The founder of the World Wide Web Foundation said the internet had created opportunities for good but had also become a space used by “scammers” and “given a voice to those who spread hatred, and made all kinds of crime easier to commit”.

First proposed by Mr Berners-Lee as an information management system in 1989 while he was working for the European Organisation for Nuclear Research (CERN), around half of the world’s population is now online.

Many of the world’s largest web-based companies, such as Facebook, Twitter and Google, have come under scrutiny in recent years over data privacy issues and the rising spread of malicious and offensive content.

In his letter, the inventor said it would be “defeatist and unimaginative” to assume that the web could not be changed for the better given how far it has come in its first 30 years.

However, he urged governments, organisations and the public to work together to improve the current system and make it available to everyone.

“If we give up on building a better web now, then the web will not have failed us - we will have failed the web,” he said.

He outlined what he called three sources of dysfunction that must be addressed

“deliberate, malicious intent, such as state-sponsored hacking and attacks, criminal behaviour, and online harassment”

“system design” which has created “perverse incentives where user value is sacrificed, such as ad-based revenue models that commercially reward clickbait”

and the “viral spread of misinformation”.

He also called for a response to the “unintended negative consequences” of the web, which he said had led to “the outraged and polarised tone and quality of online discourse”.

The letter says: “While the first category is impossible to eradicate completely, we can create both laws and code to minimise this behaviour, just as we have always done offline.

“The second category requires us to redesign systems in a way that change incentives. And the final category calls for research to understand existing systems and model possible new ones or tweak those we already have.”

A global debate is currently taking place over the need for increased regulation of online spaces.

with the UK Government expected to publish a White Paper on the issue in the near future.

World Wide Web inventor Tim Berners-Lee. Picture: Andy Kropa/Invision/AP

The World Wide Web Foundation is currently developing what it calls a Contract for the Web, which aims to ensure access to the internet is recognised as a human right and is built for the public good.

“You can’t just blame one government, one social network or the human spirit. Simplistic narratives risk exhausting our energy as we chase the symptoms of these problems instead of focusing on their root causes. To get this right, we will need to come together as a global web community,” said Mr Berners-Lee.

He said the Foundation was working with governments and other organisations on building the contract, but called on politicians and wider society to do more to help build a better web and ensure the contract was not a “list of quick fixes”.

“Governments must translate laws and regulations for the digital age. They must ensure markets remain competitive, innovative and open. And they have a responsibility to protect people’s rights and freedoms online,” he said.

“We need open web champions within government - civil servants and elected officials who will take action when private sector interests threaten the public good and who will stand up to protect the open web.

“Companies must do more to ensure their pursuit of short-term profit is not at the expense of human rights, democracy, scientific fact or public safety. Platforms and products must be designed with privacy, diversity and security in mind.

“And most important of all, citizens must hold companies and governments accountable for the commitments they make, and demand that both respect the web as a global community with citizens at its heart.

“If we don’t elect politicians who defend a free and open web, if we don’t do our part to foster constructive healthy conversations online, if we continue to click consent without demanding our data rights be respected, we walk away from our responsibility to put these issues on the priority agenda of our governments.” The inventor, who was making an appearance at the Science Museum in Britain as part of the web’s anniversary celebrations, concluded by labelling the need to get the rest of the world online as “urgent”.

“The fight for the web is one of the most important causes of our time. Today, half of the world is online.

“It is more urgent than ever to ensure the other half are not left behind offline, and that everyone contributes to a web that drives equality, opportunity and creativity,” he said.

The web is for everyone and collectively we hold the power to change it.

“It won’t be easy.

“But if we dream a little and work a lot, we can get the web we want,” he added.

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Cork’s thriving technology sector links city’s early internet heritage to modern day

By Fergus Efe O'Donoghue

This month's 30th anniversary of the internet has special resonance in Cork, where University College Cork (UCC) had one of the first websites in the world, the 9th open website ever made.

UCC was made the world’s 9th web server by IT expert Dr Peter Flynn, whose family has strong Cork ties and who moved from the UK to the Rebel County to work for the college in 1984.

That website was the CURIA Irish Manuscript Project, first used to display Irish literary and historical documents. The first known website in the USA, Slack, was installed in Stanford University three months after CURIA; Cork was broadcasting Irish history into the internet before the world wide web had established in America.

The internet as we know it was first proposed on March 11, 1989 by Tim Berners-Lee at the European Organisation for Nuclear Research, better known as CERN.

Tim Berners-Lee

Mr Flynn, Ireland’s first de facto webmaster, also has the dubious honour of creating the first broken link online; he renamed a file forgetting that it was connected to Mr Berners-Lee’s machine at CERN, and received confused emails asking what he had done.

However, Cork’s college has deeper roots in the internet than Dr Flynn’s initiative. In 1849, the university - then Queen’s College Cork- welcomed the appointment of George Boole as its first professor of mathematics.

Boole, a self-made academic whose mother’s name was Joyce, was born and raised in England. Boolean Algebra has led to the theories which eventually produced digital circuit design, and Boole is seen as something akin to the founder of the Information Age.

University College Cork remains a globally leading university known for its edge in STEM fields and tech.

Cork Institute of Technology (CIT) has also recently entered the fold, with the announcement last December of the new National Cyber Security Cluster to be based there with the support of the Industrial Development Authority (IDA).

The tech industry settled in Ireland as a European HQ from the 1950s onwards, with many of the world’s most important companies, such as Google and Facebook, making their homes here - and Cork was not left out.

Since 2012, Apple says it has invested nearly €220m in developing its Hollyhill campus on the city’s northside, expanding its St Anthony’s Park facility in recent years. CEO Tim Cook told the Irish Examiner last year that Apple has been based in Cork for over 35 years, and is Cork’s largest private employer.

This is Apple’s only wholly-owned manufacturing facility in the world and is home to the company’s support service, AppleCare, which supports Europe, the Middle East, India, and Africa.

Today there are more than 14,000 jobs by IDA supported tech companies in Cork, and 86% of Cork tech companies are planning employment growth in the next three years, according to [e-mail].

Besides being home to several of the largest tech projects in Ireland, such as the Ludgate Hub and Nimbus Ireland’s largest Internet of Things Centre, Cork is also home to IT giants including IBM, Dell EMC, JCI, VMware, and Blizzard.

In the coming years Ireland is set to dominate the world stage in the software industry, and it seems that Cork will play a major part in this leap forward.