Marking the Web's 35th Birthday: An Open Letter

#1

I think that’s a nice read – This post only contains some “teaser” sentences and the headlines, so you know what to expect.

From: Tim Berners Lee - March 12, 2024

Original Hope

Three and a half decades ago, when I invented the web, its trajectory was impossible to imagine. There was no roadmap to predict the course of its evolution, it was a captivating odyssey filled with unforeseen opportunities and challenges. […]

State of Affairs

5 years ago, when the web turned 30, I called out some of the dysfunction caused by the web being dominated by the self-interest of several corporations that have eroded the web’s values and led to breakdown and harm. Now, 5 years on as we arrive at the Web’s 35th Birthday, the rapid advancement of AI has exacerbated these concerns, proving that issues on the web are not isolated but rather deeply intertwined with emerging technologies. […]

Level Set
[. . .]

Fundamental Change
[. . .]

Call for action
[. . .]

7 Likes
#2

@pmario interesting read, thanks for sharing it to the group.

POD’s sound interesting.

#3

Very good post! Salient.

IMO, TW remains a major end-user controlled way to ameliorate the serious downsides of rampant “Web 3” ideology. I am worried TW will suffer under it.

No online software/page is now outside “metrics bombardment”.

Jane Mansfield of Oxford, UK, dug a trench to prevent the invasion but it did not work. :roll_eyes:

In simpler language: “tech is being has been bent by interests that smother equal access for promotion of their information first.”

TT

#4

Keep in mind a lot of analytics is for others to take information about us, but we can turn this inside out in tiddlywiki and make analytics about us, for us, to see out own behaviour over time and use it for insight into our own behaviours and use this to enhance our own effectiveness. We can also keep this private.

1 Like
#5

Right.

PODs (=Personal Online Data store[s]) implemented first, to an extent, in Flanders.

Also. Likely big trouble indicated by the need to adopt a trial Flemish solution? :slightly_smiling_face:

~ How does all this relate to TW? Should we worry?

~ You are a fluent programmer. Are you worried by “developments” in “web” highlighted by Lee?

Just asking. TT