[shevy-java]

> 1989: Tim Berners-Lee invents the World Wide Web

I think ideas etc... existed before that, e. g. DARPA and what Alan Kay said.

Tim mostly pushed forward a simple protocol that worked. Would be interesting to see how much Tim really generated de-novo, but in general I disagree that he "invented" the world wide web as such. That would seem unfair to many other people - just like Alan Kay once said, you see further by standing on the shoulders of giants (translation: you benefitted from earlier inventions and ideas, made by other people).

[cornonthecobra]

As I was writing it out, I knew someone was going to complain.

It's an abridged timeline. Brevity because the point is the date, not the fine detail.

But since I don't care to argue on the internet... edited.

[scuff3d]

There's always someone who has to be pedantic

[exasperaited]

> Would be interesting to see how much Tim really generated de-novo, but in general I disagree that he "invented" the world wide web as such.

Eh? What do you mean it would be interesting to see? It's well-documented. Not controversial or hidden.

The HTTP protocol yes. But also the browser/editor app, WorldWideWeb, a web server for it, and the URL scheme, are literal Berners-Lee inventions. HTML may be an SGML language but it's his SGML language.

He's not claiming and nobody is claiming he invented hypertext (he would say Ted Nelson and Alan Kay).

He absolutely invented the fundamentals of the end-to-end web technology as we use it. There was no functioning internet open-hypermedia system before 1990. It's just not in question and it's kind of disingenuous to imply he didn't do much.

(Defining down "invent" in this way is also disingenuous to all inventors, who all do their work in the context of prior art)

[talkingtab]

Complained about and already modified. However, what is "wrong" is that some "person" invented the internet. We live in a time of "followers" and in that paradigm we need some singular person to follow. But it was actually a bunch of original thinkers of whom TBL was one. But it was not a person. I suspect a closer answer is the IETF, but that is also a leaky abstraction.

The point is that if you want to do something, you are probably more likely to do it well with lots of other doers. Not followers.

[cornonthecobra]

The World Wide Web is not the Internet.