9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Our weekly video hangout series!
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I think - let's see, we started a little bit off time
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so I'll say it again:
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Welcome to GV Face, our weekly video hangout series!
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Today, we are celebrating the 25th birthday of the world wide web.
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Pretty exciting. That was on Wednesday.
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Um, we've got a really all-star lineup of guests
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on today's program.
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Um, moving from left to right, we have:
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Alan Emtage, a very special guest who is
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gonna talk to us about his very special creation
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
of, uh, the first web browser...
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Um! We have Jeremy Clark, in Montreal -
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Jeremy is a technical director at Global Voices.
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Josh Levy, from Free Press,
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in Massachusetts, in the U.S.
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and Renata Avila, campaign manager [br]for the Web We Want
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Creative Commons extraordinaire, and
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GV star.
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who is joining us from Berlin!
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Welcome, everybody!
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Um. So we wanted to start today's show
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by talking a little bit about the world wide web
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and the internet.
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'Cuz a lot of people think that they're the same thing
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
when actually, that's not quite true.
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I want to first turn to Jeremy
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and just ask, Jer, could you
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break it down for us, like,
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I thought that the internet was invented in the 70's
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but, if it's the 25th birthday of the web,
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what does that mean?
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Jeremy Clark: Okay, well, the
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
best place to start, I think, is
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the internet - it has existed in various formats
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since the 1970's, as you said,
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but it was the web that really made it
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
enter our homes.
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and, so, understanding the relationship is important.
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So, the internet was invented by
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
the U.S. Government in a lot of senses...
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
...a mix of military and science funding
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
that developed the network of [br]actual computers
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that can communicate with each other over
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
wires.
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Now, another related technology that is also compri--
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[amends] uh, built in to the web
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is called hypertext. And that is the notion
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of documents that can link between each other
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immediately, without having to go and fetch
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a separate document. Um.
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So there were lots of systems since the 1960s
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that were trying to implement hypertext, like,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Xanadu is an example,
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uh, but all of them were commercial, [br]expensive, closed,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and none of them were very popular.
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So, Tim Berners-Lee, who is the[br]"inventor of the internet,"
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[corrects himself] of the web, [br]obviously, the World Wide Web -
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Um. [Tim Berners-Lee] put those two things together
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by building a service that runs
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on top of the internet, and he
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called it the World Wide Web.
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So what the World Wide Web is, is the
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decentralized hypertext engine
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that we use to communicate between
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computers' web pages.
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So what makes up WEB is three things:
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URLs (or URIs) - Universal Resource Locator
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which are the addresses we use [br]to find things on the web,
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[#2] HTML, which is the
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HyperText Markup Lanuage
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which is the way that the information
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is stored and sent
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so that we can then use browsers
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to view HTML, and then
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all the documents can be understood
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and then also they display the links
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so that the hypertext part of it works
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and we can jump around from page to page.
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Um, the final part is HTTP, which is
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the HyperText Transfer Protocol
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which is the communication method
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by which the different computers can
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talk to each other and send the
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HTML documents back and forth
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depending on the URLs.
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Um. So, when he built it, there were some
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very important things that he [br]built into this system
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that didn't exist before.
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And the main one is
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universal authorship.
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So he always intended that anyone[br]would be able
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to access these webpages,
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and anyone would be able to
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add their own webpages, without
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asking for permission.
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With the very explicit special condition
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that anyone can link to any other webpage
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without permission.
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Previous hypertext systems required that
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basically, for you to link to me,
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I have to accept that link, and
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probably create a link back to you, and
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that wasn't required on the Web, which
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gives us a lot of freedom to link to people
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who wouldn't want us to be able [br]to link to them, for example,
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so no one can say "I'm putting up free content..."
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"...but you can't send your readers here,[br]because I hate you," et cetera.
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The other one is that he made it [br]completely, completely free.
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So in the world of[br]inter--[fumbles for words]--programming
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the most free thing is generally considered
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to be the GPL [General Public License]:[br]open-source, free software licenses.
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uh, and Tim Berners-Lee actually almost used
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the GPL, because he wanted the web software
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he was building to be free.
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But at the last minute he actually changed his mind
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and made it full public domain, [br]because in certain ways
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the GPL is actually more restrictive, because it
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
forces other people - like, certain commercial actors
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
wouldn't have wanted to use web technology
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
if it were GPL, so he made it full public domain,
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and then from there went on to make all of the standards
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as open and, uh, general and free as possible.
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Uh. So that's my extremely brief[br]history of the internet.
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If anyone is curious, he wrote a wonderful book
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called "Weaving the Web" about his experiences
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[enticing tone] As you can see, it's short!
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And he has lots of interesting technical information
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
in it, without being overwhelming.
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It's very approachable
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and he's a really interesting person
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and it - the book is much better than his tweets,
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which are usually incoherent.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
[one of the participants huffs out a "whew"]
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Ellery: Ouch![br]Jeremy [?]: A few minutes?
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Ellery: Thanks, that was - that was great, Jer!
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Ellery: I mean, I think that that helps
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um, in conversations about internet policy,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and internet governance, there's a lot of emphasis
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on the ability to kind of create and innovate
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
without permission? Like, for every
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
to be able to build parts of the web, and
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what you just laid out for us makes it clear
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how important the Web piece of the infrastructure is
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
for that, for that capacity to become
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
a real tangible thing, and somebody that -[br][amends] something that now
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we can do - we don't have to have
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
technical expertise to kind of build our own[br]spaces there.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Ellery: Um. So, I wanted to -[br]Jeremy: So um.
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Jeremy: If I could add just one more thing, sorry -
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Jeremy: I just wanted to give a couple examples
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of things that happen over the internet
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that aren't the web,
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because that was the actual initial question.
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So, one example would be torrents,
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where you're the - two computers [br]connect to each other,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and stream information directly, without any URLs
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
being mixed into the process.
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Um, another one is - email, at its core,
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is its own communication protocol
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
that doesn't have to use the web,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
although we often use web sites[br]to access and manage our email.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Umm. And then another one was the one[br]right before the Web came out,
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a very popular protocol was called Gopher,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
which people liked, and sort of worked like the Web
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
- you surf around and find things -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
but it actually became commercial [br]right around the time that the web came out,
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so people would've had to start paying,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and instead of starting to pay,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
they switched to HTTP, HTML, and [br]the World Wide Web.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Ellery: Thank you.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Ellery: So I want to move to Alan, now... Um,
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Alan built the first search engine.
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And I'm kind of... like, overwhelmed, and feel sort of
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
like, giddy and nervous having him here.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Ellery: This is just - [br][Alan laughs]
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Ellery: This is, like, a really big deal!
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Ellery: So, Alan, just - if you could tell us -
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'cuz I think a lot of people don't know about Archie -
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um, it would be really cool just to hear
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about how you sort of - what you were doing
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
that made you decide to, to do this
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and kinda what it was like, and then, I mean,[br]everything you've seen since...
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Unfortunately we're time limited, but...
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Alan: Right.[br]Ellery: You know.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Alan [coughs]: Well, um, uh, well, that was back in
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1989, and, I was working as a system administrator
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for uh, McGill University - I was a grad student
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
for McGill University - and um, I was responsible
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
for getting software for - one of my responsibilities
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
was getting software for the faculty and the students.
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And at the time, the three major [br]protocols on the internet
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
- this was pre Web, ummm -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
was, uh, Telnet, which would allow you to log in
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
to a remote machine.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Email, ah, which would allow you to communicate
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
ah, with another - as we do now, with a, with a
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
remote machines, plural,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and, and FTP, which was the File Transfer Protocol,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
which allowed you to move, ah, data files, or files
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
from one machine to another.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And at the time what we had was - people had made
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
- remember it was a non-commercial internet[br]at the time -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
- actually, commercial traffic was forbidden[br]on the internet at the time,
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because it was run by the [br]National Science Foundation
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and it was using educational money
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and therefore other than companies with
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
research arms, like IBM and HP [br]and those kinds of things,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
we didn't have any commercial traffic on the internet,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
which nowadays seems kind of amazing [br]to even think about -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and, ah, so what people did, were to provide
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
to provide free space on their machines
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
- and remember, you know, at the time,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
a big disc would be a megabyte, you know -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and so people would provide common repositories
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
that you could deposit programs that you had written
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
datafiles, and documents, and that kinda stuff.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
into these central repositories that were
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
spread around the internet.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Then other people could then retrieve them.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And so I spent a lot of my time trying to locate
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
software, or the information that my, the[br]students and the faculty were trying to find,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and I got tired of it.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and since I'm lazy and a geek, I...
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I automated the process.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I got - instead of doing it manually, I had a bunch
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
of scripts wake up in the middle of the night[br]every night,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and go out and index files.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Now remember all of this was just file listings.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
It's not like Google, it's not like [br]a search engine would be today,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
it is just... filenames. All it was, was filenames.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And so what it would do
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
was it would go out every night,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
list all the filenames in all the repositories,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and allow you to search lists of filenames.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And I only used it for myself!
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I only used it, um, uh, for my own personal use.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Um, and at one point my boss,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
who was also a student, a grad student
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
at the University, let Peter Deutsch let it be known
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
that, um, somebody was asking for, you know,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
could they, could somebody tell them where, um,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
y'know, a particular piece of software was.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And, uh, uh, we, um, uh... we, you know,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
he came and asked me, [br]he knew we had this database
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and he came and asked me if I could help out.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And I gave it to him, and if, y'know,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
half a sec- half a minute later I had the information,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and so he put this posting online, and, umm.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
People then started asking,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
"Well, can you find this for me?"
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And, you know, all these manual requests!
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Basically - either through email, or UseNet postings -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
- which is what we were using at the time -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
we thought, this is silly,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
there's no point doing these things manually
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
when we can just allow people access[br]to the database itself.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And in a moment of insanity,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
we had to come up with a name for it,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and I said, "Okay, well, let's just call it ARCHI,"
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
which is "ARCHIVE" without the V
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And, ah, and within about three or four months
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
we were consuming about half
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
of all of the traffic to eastern Canada [br][where McGill University is]
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
as this search engine became - as people, y'know -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
- word of mouth -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
you know, people who know about Archie
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
are generally people of a certain age...
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
...I won't mention what that age is, but
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
it's generally people who were in university
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
or working on the internet, so it would have been
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
so it would have been research people,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
people in academia in the early nineties.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So Archie lasted for about, uh, [hems and haws]
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Five years. Four or five years.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And, um, it only indexed FTP archives.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
It never indexed the web.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Now, I went on, as Archie became popular,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and I got more involved in the standards process
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and that kind of stuff,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I worked, uh, fairly closely with Tim Berners-Lee
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
to, uh, to standardize - for example,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I did the - I ran the committee
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
at the standard-setting body for the internet,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
which is the IETF [br][Internet Engineering Task Force]
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
to standardize URLs.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Because Tim had come up with
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
a set of rules for URLS,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and as we looked at expanding that
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
to a larger range of resources,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
we realized that those rules did not cover
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
all of the cases.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So, we worked, for, uh - Tim brought the,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
the specification, his original specification,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
to the group, and we worked on it for,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I don't remember, nine months to a year or so,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
to come up with a standard for URLs.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So all of those URLs that we use,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
day in and day out,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
were, were standardized as a result
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
of that committee.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So, it was, um, it was a really exciting time,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
it was a time of, y'know - the question I always get
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
is why didn't make a billion dollars off of it?
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And I keep reminding people
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
most of the people who were pioneers -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
with the exception of Mark Andreessen
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
uhm, didn't make a whole lot of money off of these.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
these original things.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
We were working in an environment which, uh,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
put a premium on getting the technology out there
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
making it as widely available as possible -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Tim's big coup with CERN,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
which is the organization that he worked for
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
when he first developed the web
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
was to get CERN to put, um, the web software
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
that he had created into the public domain.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So it wasn't even his to give away,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
it was CERN's property.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
As an employee [of CERN], [br][Tim's work] would actually belong to CERN.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Uh. He, he actually convinced them [br]to put it in the public domain
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and that's what really, uh, y'know
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
set [amends] lit a fire under the whole thing.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
At the time, the philosophy behind it
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
was really, "Let's get this out there,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
"..this is a brave new world,"
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
"..we don't know what all of this [br]technology's gonna be used for!"
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I don't think any of us - including Tim -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
imagined what it would become.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Y'know, he always had a much grander vision of it
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
but I don't - I can guarantee you -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I've spent many, many, many, many an hour
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
with drinks, in bars, drinking with Tim,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and I can guarantee you that he did not
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
- Sir Tim, by the way, Sir Tim -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Um. I should - y'know, he even, he,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I don't think, had any idea that it would basically
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
take over the world.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and half the world's population would be using
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
the system that he created, twenty years later.[br][corrects himself] Twenty-five years later.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Ellery: Thank you so much.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Ellery: I mean, so, speaking of which, yeah,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
it has changed, and, I guess, taken over, in a way,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
um, that we, I'm sure, wouldn't have expected.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I wanted to now move to Josh and Renata,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
who are both [something falls to the floor]
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
very [she looks at the fallen object, winces]
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
committed, involved leaders in what has now
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
become a global effort to - I mean,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
the way that we're sort of putting it
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
is "save the internet"
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
or, preserve and protect the openness
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
of all of the rights to free expression, access, um,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and also privacy, that we all feel are embedded
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
actually, in the way that it was built.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So, Josh, I wondered if you could explain to us
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
really briefly what your role is in your organization
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and then also, um, tell us about
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
the Web We Want campaign, and explain, y'know,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
how you think this rights movement is shaping up
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and if you could kind of link it with everything that
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Alan just laid out for us,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
that would be really wonderful.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Josh Levy: I'll do my best.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Josh: So, my name is Josh Levy,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Josh: I'm from Free Press, [br]
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
we're a U.S.-based organization,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
we advocate for better technology and media policy
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
that allows for an open internet,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
for better representation
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
of people in the media, including media that's online,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and for open access to information.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And this issue that we're talking about -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
the anniversary of the web -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
is really central to our work,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
because we've been fighting, for example,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
to pass strong Net Neutrality policies [br]here in the U.S. for years.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Basically ever since the issue first came up,[br]in the mid-2000s,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
when we saw big internet service providers
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
blocking traffic coming from certain destinations.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And that fight is ongoing.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
The FCC, the Federal Communications Commission
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
here in the U.S., is charged with overseeing communications and technology policy,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
passed rules in 2010
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
that were intended to protect Net Neutrality
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
but were passed in a way that we knew[br]wasn't gonna hold up in court.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And we were - unfortunately, we saw that happen
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
when a court in Washington, D.C., [br]threw out those rules,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
effectively throwing out any Net Neutrality [br]protections that people have.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And so this gets back to what Jeremy was saying
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
the "internet" versus the "Web," right?
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So when we're talking about Net Neutrality,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
which I hope a lot of people have heard of,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
this concept that we should be able to access[br]any information that we want online
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
without anybody getting in the way, whether that's[br]a big company or the government -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
that is, essentially, that's a policy that applies to
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
to the ways in which all of our computers[br]connect to each other.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And we have this basic understanding[br]that the internet should be free and open,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
meaning that my computer should be able to connect
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
to yours in this global network of computers
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
without any entity inspecting the traffic,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
trying to understand what you're trying to access,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and, based on that understanding, block it.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So if it doesn't like the video you're watching, [br][it would be] slowing it down;
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
or, if it doesn't like the application you're using, [br]blocking it -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
- that, that should be totally unacceptable.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
We should be able to connect to whatever we want[br]in whatever way we want.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And that includes using the Web, right?
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So the Web is basically an application
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
The internet's this global network,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
the Web is just one application that [br]uses this global network.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And so it's essential - [br]Net Neutrality is essential to using the web,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
because as we've seen today,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
using the web is so essential to all of our lives
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and big companies, and governments, have so much power over it that they can block all kinds of things:
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
political speech, videos that we wanna watch,[br]pictures of cats, et cetera.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So. Um, anyway, so that's what Free Press is doing,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
in large part, trying to protect [br]that notion of Net Neutrality.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And out of that fight came a number of campaigns,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
including the campaign to stop SOPA[br][Stop Online Piracy Act]
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
- which was the bad copyright bill a couple years ago[br]here in the U.S. -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and out of that came a realization, I think,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
here in the U.S. but [also] around the world,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
that we all needed to kind of talk to each other[br]a little bit more.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
those of us who have been advocating for a free[br]and open internet for a long time.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And so we started doing that:
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Free Press led the development the drafting of
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
something called the [br]"Declaration of Internet Freedom"
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
which was a simple statement of principles[br]about our right to access information online.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And out of that came a really fruitful relationship[br]with Tim Berners-Lee's organization,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
- the World Wide Web Foundation -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and we discussed ways in which we could move [br]that effort forward,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
this Declaration effort,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
to involve more groups around the world, [br]more people around the world,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and to guarantee that we all have [br]access to information
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and that that access, and the principles behind it,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
are not the domain of any one country, [br]or any one group of individuals.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So, out of that came this great project,[br]the Web We Want,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
which Renata's gonna tell you more about.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
which is seeking to do just that:
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
to pass laws, around the world, that will protect [br]people's right to access the internet
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and to access content on the Web [br]without anybody getting in the way,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and, uh, it's building steam very, very quickly -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
we are working with countries around the world to [br]develop their own set of principles
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
regarding the web and our rights on it,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and organizing lots and lots of organizations that [br]are really excited about getting involved in this effort
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and our dream of uniting groups who are all fighting [br]the same fight but in different parts of the world
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
is kind of coming to life. [br]
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So, I'll let Renata tell you more about that.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Renata Avila: Eum, hello everyone, everybody,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
it's really good to be here?
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Renata: Ah, so: Web We Want.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
The Web We Want is a coalition of [br][gestures as she searches for words]
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
very important groups of organizations [br]from [unintelligible] society
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Ah, I will mention [some] of them:
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Access, that many of us are familiar with;[br][AccessNow.org]
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
APC; [br][Association for Progressive Communications]
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Free Press;
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
7iber, in Jordan; [br]the Open Source Association, in Jordan as well;
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
[ums and ers]
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Consumers International; Article 19; [br]Fundação Getulio Vargas, in Brazil;
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
IT for Change, in India; [br]Public Knowledge, in the U.S.;
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and we, we have a - we got the confirmation that[br]Open Knowledge Foundation,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
which has affiliates all over the world,[br]will join as well.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So, basically, the campaign... [br]
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
..what we are trying to achieve here
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
is to move from the reactions, [br]
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
the constant reactions to the civil society we have,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
to a proactive approach.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
To have a positive agenda, to have the safe [??] first, in different countries.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And also globally [??]
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And what happens is usually that we come together last minute -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
we react to bad legislation being proposed,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
by either specific [interest groups], or a very [br]creative but not so well informed legislator...
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And so, in the last, let's say, five years,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
we have seen so many mobilizations against, against, against.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So we think that yes, it's good to have a reaction[br]to bad legislation,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
but it's much more effective to have a proposal[br]coming from civil society.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And not only - like, civil society understood as a -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
a more extended way [than] we usually use in [discussions of] internet governance -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
but civil society involving everyone[br]in a fight for our rights.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And so we have different activities and [br]different actions to achieve that.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
The first would be intense work in [br]specific countries where we [gestures]
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
together, all the advisory committee, [br]so that there's something going on,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
some movement in civil society,[br]and there's some action there.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So, the list of the countries that we have decided[br]will be like the first "grant-ees" [i.e. recipients]
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
of um, more stronger support from the punt [???] where we want manages [???] will be:
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Japan, Indonesia, Philippines, India, Bangladesh, Brazil, Ecuador, the U.K., Tunisia, Nigeria, Kenya...
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
...and South Africa.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So, as you see, it's mostly [br]countries of the global south.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Also the U.K., because we saw an opportunity there,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and we also saw a regression of rights.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
It is very interesting to see how the [br]deterioration of rights in a country -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
- even in a democratic country -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
in the last ten years, has been very extreme.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And this is really affecting the region.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Apart from this intense work that we are planning to do, having national dialogues in these countries,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I have informed you of,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
we have also - we are launching, [br]on the 21st of March, a mini-grant round.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
The mini-grants are for everyone to apply, so you don't need to be an NGO
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
so you don't need to be an NGO, you don't need to be an expert to apply for these grants.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
What we want is normal people -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
- artists, musicians, everyone -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
to be involved in this and [unintelligible] [br]to celebrate, to party for the Web!
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
But at the same time celebrate the Web, we[br]start a conversation on what is the web we want?
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
What is - [struggles for words]
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
- which values, which form we want, which way we want to protect the Web in our countries.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
The free and open Web.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And so it can be as simple as [br]a screening in a public space?
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
It can be more elaborate, [br]like a talk at your local library?
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
It can be anything you want, [br]it can be even a sculpture in the middle of a city.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
ah, telling people what the Web [br]represents [means] to you.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
But also, we know that we cannot abandon [br]those fighting "against."
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So we have rapid response grants.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And these rapid response grants are for, ehh -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
we, we have identified that sometimes to make[br]something happen, you need some resources.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Especially in some countries in the global south.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So. For example, ehh, think about [br]a very bad surveillance law.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
about to be passed in, oh, Nicaragua.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So, this rapid response -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
- which will be open during the whole year -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
- will allow activists to say, "Hey, listen. [br]This very bad thing is happening..."
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
"..and we think that if we gather a group of people[br]together, and we print, uh, leaflets..."
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
"..and we make a short video about it, we have[br]a good chance to shift the opinions to our side."
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
"The side of right."
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And so that will be open as well, that will be open on the 21st of March, and remain open the whole year.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And what we will achieve at the end of the year is a[br]very interesting collection of experiences.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
We will see that - [finds her words]
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
what is the Web people want,[br]in the specific countries,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
with more intense follow-up [br]mechanism and dialogue.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
We will also see which techniques are [br]the best for rapid response
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
when there's a threat to the open internet.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
by the collection of experiences from the rapid response grants.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And also we will learn from ways to engage the broader public in our topics and in our issues.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So I am very hopeful that especially [br]artists, or very creative activists,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
will find ways to engage the broader public.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Because we need - this is ours.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
The future of [the open internet] [br]depends on us preserving it.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And the more people invited to this fight,[br]the stronger we get.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
At last, I will... I would like to invite everyone to be engaged the way that you can engage.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And to apply for these grants!
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
But not only to apply for these grants -[br]to make things your own.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
If you want to write an article, [br]if you are an expert on specific topics,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
please write articles, [br]please share your knowledge with people,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and please engage, and don't be apathetic.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Because the Web offers us -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
- and the internet offers us -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
- this opportunity to communicate and connect beyond borders,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and I think that, slowly, we are building this platform -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
- which is not a website but is a platform made of [amends her description] collective –
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
- that is ready to jump and to take actions to save[br]the web any moment that it is under threat.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So. Yes. That's it.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Ellery [laughs]: Thanks.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Ellery: It's really - I think it's great to sort of, [br]to have that out there,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
for people to understand all the ways [br]that they can get involved.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
One thing I - so, in thinking about how can we make a little show today that would celebrate the web,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I couldn't help but think about Global Voices,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
because that's what brings us all together here,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and, I think that our community, in so many ways -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I mean, we couldn't exist, wouldn't exist, [br]without the Web,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
but there are also so many particular attributes of it,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
when it comes to access and openness,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
that allow us to do all the things that we do,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
like, including this hangout, right now.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Um. So I wanted to ask -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
- although we're really short on time -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Jer, you, I kind of, I said, is there...
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
...could you talk a little bit about what, [br]if you look at Global Voices,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and sort of the way that it's grow up, [br]um, with the internet -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
- you've been here since the beginning,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
so you can kind of - just, just tell us a bit.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Jeremy Clark: Okay, well, uh,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Jeremy: I actually haven't been with [br]Global Voices since the very beginning,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
but I joined near the start.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So, maybe you can see on my screen -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
- Global Voices was started in 2005, um,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and one of the great things about the story is that it [br]was started quickly and easily by Ethan Zuckerman
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
who set up the original site, uh,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
along with Rebecca McKinnon, [br]who worked on the idea and the content,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and so, they actually used WordPress, which [br]is the system we still use today,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and which is very similar to the Web[br]in a lot of senses
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
because it's a distributed project,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
people all around the world develop it,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
it's open-source, free,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
(and it is [free] not by convenience but very explicit philosophy and they're very active in defending that)
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and also in another way: uh, originally, at the time,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
there was a very popular free software [br]called Movable Type
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and instead of starting to pay for it, [br]people switched to Wordpress.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So, this was our original website.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
We later redesigned it several times.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And over the years, we have grown with WordPress
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
to take advantage of the new features... um.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
[gestures] - keep running our site.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And so running our whole infrastructure on this very decentralized open-source model has been
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
a really rewarding experience for us,[br]just as using the Web has.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And obviously, the, uh, one of the most[br]interesting things is that
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Global Voices is all about the web.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Without the Web, [br]without that decentralized authorship,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
- anyone can write to it -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
there would be no Global Voices.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Uh, the whole point of global voices was to
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
recognize that people all over the world
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
were taking advantage of the benefits of the Web,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and create one place where you could find it,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
sort of like Archie was with the pre-Web TelNet days
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
a archive of things happening all around -
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
- that's what Global Voices did.
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Um. So. Yeah!
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And, y'know, we've tried a lot of different
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
infrastructure based around the web over the years;
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
uh, we've used Drupal,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
we've used a lot of different online services,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
obviously, like everyone else,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
the temptation to take advantage of Google's
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
free offerings has always been [br]part of Global Voices' DNA,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
we use Google mailing lists,
9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
we use all the different things that they make for free