A graduate of Oxford University, England, in 1989, Tim Berners-Lee invented the World Wide Web, an internet-based hypermedia initiative for global information sharing while at CERN, the European Particle Physics Laboratory. He wrote the first web client and server in 1990. His specifications of URIs, HTTP and HTML were refined as Web technology spread.
He is the 3Com Founders Professor of Engineering in the School of Engineering with a joint appointment in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at the Laboratory for Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence ( CSAIL) at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) where he also heads the Decentralized Information Group (DIG). He is also a Professor in the Electronics and Computer Science Department at the University of Southampton, UK.
He is the Director of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), a Web standards organization founded in 1994 which develops interoperable technologies (specifications, guidelines, software, and tools) to lead the Web to its full potential. He is a founding Director of the Web Science Trust (WST) launched in 2009 to promote research and educaton in Web Science, the multidisciplinary study of humanity connected by technology.
He is also a Director of the World Wide Web Foundation, launched in 2009 to fund and coordinate efforts to further the potential of the Web to benefit humanity.
In 2001 he became a Fellow of the Royal Society. He has been the recipient of several international awards including the Japan Prize, the Prince of Asturias Foundation Prize, the Millennium Technology Prize and Germany's Die Quadriga award. In 2004 he was knighted by H.M. Queen Elizabeth and in 2007 he was awarded the Order of Merit. In 2009 he was elected a foreign associate of the National Academy of Sciences. He is the author of "Weaving the Web".
In June 2009 Prime Minister Gordon Brown announced Sir Tim will work with the UK Government to help make data more open and accessible on the Web, building on the work of the Power of Information Task Force.
If you have a serious comment on things I have signed, then do email me. I am also always open to discussion with W3C Advisory Committee representatives.
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If you want to know what we are working on now, look at the W3C site and check out all the activities at W3C. Also see:
Essays and articles in text form
I do few of these because of pressure of work and the detrimental effects of travel. However, I do enjoy occasionally giving a keynote address. If you have something you seriously think I would be interested in speaking at, please send email to timbl+speaking@w3.org with details of the event, projected audience size and profile, location and date. (Please do not contact mutual friends or family to ask for a favor for your company, as that puts unfair pressure on everyone. Just ask directly.)
Do use a subject like say "Keynote in Milan, 23 Febrary 2100 at ISWC2100" including the date and place proposed.
If I use slides (I often do not) I use a laptop -- currently a Mac running OSX. I do not need audio from the laptop.
If you want to test your video on similar stuff, run a web browser on a recent one of my previous talks.
If you need a photo for publication, please complete the W3C photo request form. You do not need an account to complete the form, but an email address is required.
Alternatively, you can ask:
If you need an interview for an article, please check the
first, then please use email rather than phone. Please contact w3t-pr@w3.org the general PR request line at W3C, rather than Amy van der Hiel (my assistant) or Ian Jacobs (Head of Communications at W3C) to set up interviews with me or with other W3C staff.
[Photo: in Sheldonian, Oxford: LeFevre communications, 2001.]
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