Tim Berners-Lee: I Invented the World Wide Web. Here’s How We Can Fix It.

While the web enables incredible creativity, knowledge sharing, and progress, it also enables a lot of harm. Tim Berners-Lee is leading a global project to protect the web from being abused - and protect our information from being misused.As he writes in the New York Times:

My parents were mathematicians. My mother helped code one of the first stored-program computers — the Manchester Mark 1. They taught me that when you program a computer, what you can do is limited only by your imagination. That excitement for experimentation and change helped me build the World Wide Web. I had hoped that 30 years from its creation, we would be using the web foremost for the purpose of serving humanity.

Instead of wringing his hands or retiring on his laurels and leaving the problems to the next generation, Berners-Lee is leading newly created Contract for the Web, a global plan of action to make sure our online world is safe, empowering and genuinely for everyone.

Principle 1 – Ensure everyone can connect to the internet
Principle 2 – Keep all of the internet available, all of the time
Principle 3 – Respect and protect people’s fundamental online privacy and data rights
Principle 4 – Make the internet affordable and accessible to everyone.
Principle 5 – Respect and protect people’s privacy and personal data to build online trust.
Principle 6 – Develop technologies that support the best in humanity and challenge the worst.
Principle 7 – Be creators and collaborators on the Web.
Principle 8 – Build strong communities that respect civil discourse and human dignity.
Principle 9 – Fight for the Web