By Mark Rawcliffe from the PC Centre Lagoa [email protected]
Two weeks ago saw the 20th anniversary of one of the wonders of the modern computer era – the World Wide Web.
On August 6, 1991, mastermind Tim Berners-Lee, now Sir Tim Berners-Lee, made the web a publicly available service on the internet.
Before it went public, the web was used to allow physicists at the CERN physics laboratory to share data, news and documents, but releasing it to the public, openly available and royalty free, saw the web quickly advance to a globally used service, by individuals and companies, the technologically and not so technically minded amongst us.
The past twenty years have seen the web become an integral part of daily life.
Most, if not all, of us have used or been influenced by the web, either for the better or the worse.
The late 1990s saw the boom and subsequent bust of dot-com businesses. Household names such as eBay and Amazon were amongst the few to survive and have continued to grow.
Many individuals and companies cashed in on the boom, buying and selling domain names – it was almost a licence to print money.
These days, a domain name can cost you less than €10 a year, but purchases do tend to be without regulation in most cases.
Passing off has become big business over the years with obviously jealous individuals and companies alike, attempting to deceive the public that they are who they are not. This newspaper was targeted but discerning readers soon realised what was happening.
Mobile devices, such as Windows Phones, PDA’s, the iPhone and Pads have seen the web ‘on the move’ with more and more users utilising the wealth of information wherever they are. Even televisions are coming equipped with internet capability allowing users the option of using one piece of hardware for all of the entertainment – television, radio, web, gaming – the list goes on and on.
Of course for every positive, there is of course the negative – for me that is email!
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