One of the most remarkable inventions ever in the history of the human race is the invention of the World Wide Web. In the middle of the 15th century Johannes Gutenberg a German goldsmith, invented the movable type printing in Europe. His technology replaced books that had to be created by hand . Knowledge spread like wildfire and the human race became more rational and less superstitious. The result, of course, was an improvement in the evolution of civilizations and the speed with which they arose. The availability of books made the Renaissance possible. It facilitated scientific publication. It resulted in the collapse of the domination of dogmas of Catholicism because Martin Luther's 95 Theses, posted on the door of his church, were widely printed and circulated. Similarly the invention of the World Wide Web by Sir Timothy John "Tim" Berners-Lee, KBE (born June 8, 1955 in London, England) is changing the face of our world. Knowledge is now literally at your fingertips. If you need to find out anything, from the weather to some obscure facts in a specialized field of study, just type in a search for it and with the billions of websites now available, you are bound to find the answer. The entire database of human knowledge has now become available to everyone.. He was born in London, England. Both his parents were mathematicians and were part of the team that built one of the earliest computer, the Manchester Mark I. He learned to use mathematics everywhere, including at the dinner table. At Oxford University, he built a computer with a soldering iron and an old television. Graduating in physics in 1976, he went to work for a company called Plessey Controls Limited in Poole that specialized in traffic lights. Then in 1978, he created a typesetting software and an operating system when he worked for another company in Poole, D.G. Nash Limited. Berners-Lee then worked as an independent contractor for CERN. The NeXT cube became the first Web server. He proposed the concept of hypertext to facilitate sharing and updating research information. He built a prototype system named ENQUIRE. In 1989, Berner's Lee saw how to join hypertext with the Internet. In his own words: "I just had to take the hypertext idea and connect it to the TCP and DNS ideas and ta-da! the World Wide Web." In 1990, working with Robert Cailliau, he produced a revision. He used ideas that were behind the Enquire system to fashion the World Wide Web. He built the first web browser and editor called World Wide Web and the first web server called Hyper Text Transfer Protocol daemon. CERN had the first web site in the world. It went online on August 6, 1991. It explained browsers, servers, and directories, and how to set them up. Berners-Lee made his idea available freely. He did not reserve a patent or ask for royalties. He has received numerous academic and business honors and awards, including USD $1.2 million by President of Finland, Tarja Halonen, on April 15, 2004, as the first recipient of Finland's Millennium Technology Prize for inventing the World Wide Web. He was also given the rank of Knight Commander (the second-highest rank in the Order of the British Empire) by Queen Elizabeth II. This was part of the New Year's Honors ceremony, on July 16, 2004. The 1999 Time Magazine edition called him one of the 100 most influential people of the twentieth century. Today he lives in Lexington, Massachusetts (USA) with his wife and two children. The world wide web is literally an artificial global brain, where information is contributed by millions of people around the world and made publicly available to all. The next step in the evolution of knowledge will be when the entire university system will be coordinated and organized and made available online at no cost, and anyone will be able to learn anything without having to worry about location, cost, admission standards or any of the other barriers that keep education reserved for the wealthier people in the wealthier countries. The future holds the promise that everybody, all over the world, will have the chance to be literate. The technology exists for that to happen. As long as the internet is allowed to continue to grow without interference from controlling powers, knowledge will also continue to flourish organically and bring humans together in a common understanding of how to make this world a better place. The invention of the World Wide Web is in our day what the Renaissance and the Age of Enlightenment was for people of an earlier era. It may even prove to be more of a giant leap for humankind than the landing on the moon.
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