Web's inventor, Tim Berners-Lee, aims to make it truly world wide

Stuart Corner
Monday, 15 September 2008 11:17

Business IT - Networking

The inventor of the World Wide Web, Sir Tim Berners-Lee, is looking for supporters to back his vision of bringing the Web's benefits to the entire world population, and has been given a flying start with a $US5 million donation from a US charitable foundation.

Berners-Lee has unveiled the World Wide Web Foundation to fulfil his vision of the Web as humanity connected by technology. Its mission is: "to advance One Web that is free and open, to expand the Web's capability and robustness, and to extend the Web's benefits to all people on the planet."

"Through this new initiative, we hope to develop an international ecosystem that will help shape the future Web. A more inclusive Web will benefit us all," Berners-Lee said.

"The Web is a tremendous platform for innovation, but we face a number of challenges to making it more useful, in particular to people in underserved communities," said Berners-Lee, who is presently a director of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), and co-director of the Web Science Research Initiative (WSRI). Both these organisation have helped put together the World Wide Web Foundation.

The foundation hopes to "enable all people to share knowledge, access services, conduct commerce, participate in good governance, and communicate in creative ways...through research, technology development and the application of the Web for the benefit of underserved communities." It will raise funds through a multifaceted strategy, beginning with a $US5 million seed grant over five years from the John S and James L Knight Foundation.

This organisation was founded in the US by the newspaper-owning Knight brothers. It promotes journalism excellence worldwide and invests in the vitality of communities in the United States. Since 1950, it has made more than $US1 billion in grants, including more than $US400 million to support journalism excellence and free speech.

The Knight Foundation's initial $US5 million wil be used to cover initial costs of establishing the World Wide Web Foundation, starting a capital campaign, and developing strategic plans for the Foundation's programs. It aims to raise up to $US100 million "to fund projects that will have significant impact in the identified programs."

According to Berners-Lee, the Foundation is in the unique position of being able to improve the Web by bringing together existing communities, governments, NGOs, and other stakeholders who see the Web as an instrument of creativity, collaboration, and communication. It will pursue its objectives by funding projects around the world in three strategically integrated programs related to research, technology, and social development.

Social development efforts will focus initially on underserved populations. The Web Foundation will identify benefits of the Web for these communities, and issues of access to (and availability of) relevant, usable, and useful content. It will do so "through support of ongoing and new efforts to develop critical services related to better health care, nutrition, education, and emergency relief."

The foundation is in the initial planning phase. It has named Steve Bratt, presently CEO of W3C as its CEO and plans to launch in early 2009 when it will take "the first concrete steps toward fulfilling its mission," according to Bratt. He expects step down from his position as CEO of W3C by mid-2009 to focus entirely on the work of the Web Foundation. He has invited those who share the foundation's vision for the Web to become founding donors. Expressions of interest to This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .