Released: September 27, 2006

Internet pioneer speaks for Net Neutrality

Source: By John Markoff, New York Times (Free Registration)

Sir Tim Berners-Lee was a software programmer working at the CERN physics research laboratory in Switzerland in the 1980’s when he proposed the idea of a project based on hypertext — linking documents with software pointers.

The World Wide Web went online in 1991 and rapidly grew beyond the physics community. In 1994, Sir Tim founded the World Wide Web Consortium at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to promote open standards on the Internet. Earlier this year, he began speaking out in favor of “Net neutrality.” The term describes one side in the debate in the United States over whether Internet service providers should be able to control the order in which they route packets of data — or even be able to reject those packets — or whether they should be required to be neutral on the matter. For example, in some cases ISPs have restricted the routing of services provided by competitors like Internet phone calls.

He answered questions earlier this month by telephone from Cambridge, Mass.

Q. Why did you decide to speak out on Net neutrality?

A. I have had an opinion on Net neutrality since I mentioned it in a book — effectively, but not by that name — a long time ago. It’s not a new opinion and it’s one thing that is shared by such a huge majority, if you like an unwritten assumption of the entire Internet culture. Someone actually thought to challenge it.

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