Abstract
In 2012, the ACM Turing Award winner Alan Kay released an interview with Dr. Dobb’s Journal in which he stated “the Web was done by amateurs.” In this first chapter, we look at possible motivations for such a statement and we introduce three important characters that recur throughout the book: the inventor of the Web, Tim Berners-Lee; hypertext pioneer, Ted Nelson; and Alan Kay.
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Notes
- 1.
Even though “The Web was made by amateurs” is preferable in English, the book is titled “The Web was done by amateurs” to match literally the statement of Alan Kay. His full interview is reproduced in the appendix.
- 2.
The Award was created in 1966 with no monetary value. From 2007 to 2014 it was accompanied by a $250,000 award, and thereafter by $1,000,000.
References
Barnes, S. B. (2003). ACM Turing Award biography. http://amturing.acm.org/award_winners/kay_3972189.cfm
Berners-Lee, T., & Fischetti, M. (1999). Weaving the web: The original design and ultimate destiny of the world wide web by its inventor. San Francisco: Harper.
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Aiello, M. (2018). The Web Was Done by Amateurs. In: The Web Was Done by Amateurs. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-90008-7_1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-90008-7_1
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