In 1989, while working at CERN, Berners-Lee proposed a system that would eventually become the World Wide Web. But perhaps the most extraordinary part of the story is not the invention itself. It is the decision he made afterward. He chose not to privatize the web. He chose not to build toll booths around it. He released its foundational protocols freely into the world so anyone could use them.
It is difficult to imagine such a gesture today. In our current technological culture, where SpaceX IPOs can create trillionaires overnight, innovation is often immediately tied to monetization. A handful of technology companies compete to capture human attention, dominate S&P 500 markets, and life itself at an enormous scale. The internet increasingly feels less like a shared commons and more like contested territory owned by competing empires. And yet Berners-Lee’s vision of the web was rooted in openness. In his book, he recounts that he didn’t want to close it off to the world, which he very well could have done, but wanted it shared.
As someone who works in libraries, I feel a deep emotional connection to that ethos. Libraries have long defended the idea that knowledge should remain publicly accessible. A library card represents trust rather than extraction. One can wander through shelves privately, follow unexpected curiosities, or encounter new ideas without being transformed into data points for advertisers.
The early internet often carried a similar spirit. I still remember the feeling of wandering through old websites, personal blogs, discussion forums, and fan pages in the early days of the web. Much of it was imperfect and amateurish, but it felt profoundly human. Then Web 2.0 came along, and people shared knowledge because they cared enough. Communities formed around curiosity rather than algorithms. There was a genuine thirst for discovery.
Today, however, I increasingly worry about what the internet has become. The rise of AI has intensified these concerns, and companies led by figures like Elon Musk and Sam Altman are building systems trained on billions of pieces of human expression scraped from the free web: everything from books, artwork, old Reddit posts, and personal writing accumulated over years. Thus, openness of the web — the very thing Berners-Lee protected — has become vulnerable to monetary extraction.
A trauma-informed perspective is useful here. Trauma-informed care asks us to pay attention to power, consent, safety, trustworthiness, and the effects that systems have on human well-being. Increasingly, the current Internet seems designed around the opposite conditions. Social media platforms reward outrage and compulsive engagement. Algorithms amplify anxiety because doomscrolling keeps people captivated. Human attention becomes something to be continuously captured and monetized. Many people now move through digital life in states of chronic exhaustion and overstimulation.
The nervous system rarely gets to rest. As a librarian, I sometimes worry that screens are reshaping our public institutions. Libraries are pressured to become more efficient and more data-driven. The deeper purpose of libraries has never merely been information delivery. It’s about human connection.
In this sense, I believe Tim Berners-Lee’s original vision still matters profoundly. He reminds us that technology need not emerge solely from extraction or domination. The web was born from collaboration and openness. Berners-Lee could have become unimaginably wealthy by laying the foundations of the internet. Instead, he made a decision rooted in public good.
That choice feels increasingly rare and courageous nowadays in the age of AI. We praise those who accumulate power quickly while forgetting those who quietly built the conditions that allowed the digital world to exist in the first place.
But perhaps history will remember Berners-Lee differently, because he currently seems to be a mere afterthought, almost forgotten. For those of us who still believe in libraries, public knowledge, and the importance of humane spaces in an increasingly extractive culture, that legacy matters deeply to me.
It is difficult to imagine such a gesture today. In our current technological culture, where SpaceX IPOs can create trillionaires overnight, innovation is often immediately tied to monetization. A handful of technology companies compete to capture human attention, dominate S&P 500 markets, and life itself at an enormous scale. The internet increasingly feels less like a shared commons and more like contested territory owned by competing empires. And yet Berners-Lee’s vision of the web was rooted in openness. In his book, he recounts that he didn’t want to close it off to the world, which he very well could have done, but wanted it shared.
As someone who works in libraries, I feel a deep emotional connection to that ethos. Libraries have long defended the idea that knowledge should remain publicly accessible. A library card represents trust rather than extraction. One can wander through shelves privately, follow unexpected curiosities, or encounter new ideas without being transformed into data points for advertisers.
The early internet often carried a similar spirit. I still remember the feeling of wandering through old websites, personal blogs, discussion forums, and fan pages in the early days of the web. Much of it was imperfect and amateurish, but it felt profoundly human. Then Web 2.0 came along, and people shared knowledge because they cared enough. Communities formed around curiosity rather than algorithms. There was a genuine thirst for discovery.
Today, however, I increasingly worry about what the internet has become. The rise of AI has intensified these concerns, and companies led by figures like Elon Musk and Sam Altman are building systems trained on billions of pieces of human expression scraped from the free web: everything from books, artwork, old Reddit posts, and personal writing accumulated over years. Thus, openness of the web — the very thing Berners-Lee protected — has become vulnerable to monetary extraction.
A trauma-informed perspective is useful here. Trauma-informed care asks us to pay attention to power, consent, safety, trustworthiness, and the effects that systems have on human well-being. Increasingly, the current Internet seems designed around the opposite conditions. Social media platforms reward outrage and compulsive engagement. Algorithms amplify anxiety because doomscrolling keeps people captivated. Human attention becomes something to be continuously captured and monetized. Many people now move through digital life in states of chronic exhaustion and overstimulation.
The nervous system rarely gets to rest. As a librarian, I sometimes worry that screens are reshaping our public institutions. Libraries are pressured to become more efficient and more data-driven. The deeper purpose of libraries has never merely been information delivery. It’s about human connection.
In this sense, I believe Tim Berners-Lee’s original vision still matters profoundly. He reminds us that technology need not emerge solely from extraction or domination. The web was born from collaboration and openness. Berners-Lee could have become unimaginably wealthy by laying the foundations of the internet. Instead, he made a decision rooted in public good.
That choice feels increasingly rare and courageous nowadays in the age of AI. We praise those who accumulate power quickly while forgetting those who quietly built the conditions that allowed the digital world to exist in the first place.
But perhaps history will remember Berners-Lee differently, because he currently seems to be a mere afterthought, almost forgotten. For those of us who still believe in libraries, public knowledge, and the importance of humane spaces in an increasingly extractive culture, that legacy matters deeply to me.
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