It has now been 30 years since the European research organization released what we now call the “web” for free.
The web started as a proposal from Tim Berners-Lee while he was working at CERN in 1989. It was intended as a system for researchers to share information with each other on an internet-based platform.
It all came to be called the World Wide Web (W3) and was used internally at CERN in 1990 before being released publicly the following year. On April 30, 1992, CERN released W3 for free in the so-called public domain. CERN writes about the event itself:
30 years ago, on 30 April 1993, CERN made an important announcement. Walter Hoogland and Helmut Weber, respectively the Director of Research and Director of Administration at the time, decided to publicly release the tool that Tim Berners-Lee had first proposed in 1989 to allow scientists and institutes working on #CERN data all over the globe to share information accurately and quickly. Little did they know how much it would change the world.
Above, you can check out a clip where Walter Hoogland talks a little more about the historic event. Below is the document where CERN releases W3 for free.
