Weaving the Web: The Original Design and Ultimate Destiny of the World Wide Web

Berners-Lee writes a very fun and informative treatise on his experiences towards creating the Web as we utilize it today. The first nine chapters detail his background and history, up to his move to the United States. A lot of the material describing the internal workings of the CERN environment were absolutely compelling material. The rest of the book follows his work within the W3C, along with his long-range vision of the Web. While the book holds a time-frame of 1999/2000 - much of his observations still hold true today in 2013.

I love this quote from Tim Berners-Lee, the man responsible for the World Wide Web. He’s a low profile genius who never profited from his invention. I often think about him when i talk to my investment banking friends, or other people who are placing monetary gain over what really makes them happy. This is a quote from his book Weaving the Web which is a pretty good read if you’re interested in how the web came about, what the original thoughts were about it, and how it’s survived attempts by private industry (Microsoft, IBM, etc.) to control it.

People have sometimes asked me whether i am upset that i have not made a lot of money from the Web. In fact, I made some quite conscious decisions about which way to take my life. These I show more would not change - though i am making no comment on what i might do in the future. What does distress me, though, is how important a question it seems to be to some. This happens mostly in America, not Europe. What is maddening is the terrible notion that a person’s value depends on how important and financially successful they are, and that that is measured in terms of money. That suggests disrespect for the researchers across the globe developing ideas for the next leaps in science and technology. Core in my upbring was a value system that put monetary gain well in its place, behind things like doing what i really want to do. To use net worth as a criterion by which to judge people is to set our children’s sights on cash rather than on things that will actually make them happy. show less

His Masters Voice.

His Masters Voice.

I only got halfway through this, though I can't remember why.

Writer Lev Grossman has chosen to discuss Tim Berners-Lee’s Weaving the Web: The Past, Present and Future of the World Wide Web by its Inventor on FiveBooks as one of the top five on his subject- The World Wide Web, saying that:


"...This book is extremely engaging and readable. It’s very similar in some ways to Francis Crick’sThe Double Helix, and he really just talks about where his invention came from, how it happened, and what everything you read about the history of the Internet tells you that a lot of it happened by accident...."


The full interview is available here: http://five-books.com/interviews/lev-grossman

Found this at an estate sale in Ann Arbor. Seems like an essential item for my small collection of books about the Internet.