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256 lines
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256 lines
14 KiB
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<TITLE>Declaration by Tim BL 28 Feb 1996 w.r.t. CDA challenge</TITLE>
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Declaration presented by <A href="./">Tim Berners-Lee</A>
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I, Timothy J Berners-Lee, depose and state as follows:
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1. I am the inventor of the World Wide Web and the Director of the World
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Wide Web Consortium (W3C). The W3C is a consortium of over 120 computer and
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communications companies who have come together to maintain and develop the
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technical standards that are at the heart of the World Wide Web. The W3C
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is operated within the Laboratory for Computer Science at the Massachusetts
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Institute of Technology.
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<H2>
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BACKGROUND OF THE WORLD WIDE WEB
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</H2>
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2. Purpose. I created the World Wide Web (W3) to serve as the platform for
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a global, online store of knowledge, containing information from a diversity
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of sources, and accessible to Internet users around the world. Though information
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on the Web is contained in individual computers, the fact that each of these
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computers is connected to the Internet through W3 protocols allows all of
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the information to become part of a single body of knowledge. It is currently
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the most advanced information system developed on the Internet, and embraces
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within its data model most information in previous networked information
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systems such as ftp, gopher, wais, and Usenet.
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3. History. W3 was originally developed at CERN, the European Particle Physics
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Laboratory, and initially used to allow information sharing within
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internationally dispersed teams of researchers and engineers. Originally
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aimed at the High Energy Physics community, it has spread to other areas
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and attracted much interest in user support, resource recovery, and numerous
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other areas which depend on collaborative and information sharing. The Web
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has extended beyond the scientific and academic community to include
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business-to-business communication, political organizing and activism, community
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development, library collection management, art display and archiving,
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alternative dissemination mechanisms for a variety of popular music, and
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access to local, state and federal government information.
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<P>
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4. Basic Operation. The World Wide Web is a series of documents stored in
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different computers all over the Internet. Documents contain information
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stored in a variety of formats, including text, still images, sounds, and
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video. An essential element of the web in that any document has an address
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(rather like a telephone number). Most web documents contain "links". These
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are short sections of text or image which refer to another document. Typically
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the linked text is blue or underlined when displayed, and when selected by
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the user, the referenced document is automatically displayed, wherever in
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the world it actually is stored.
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<P>
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Links for example are used to lead from overview documents to more detailed
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documents, from tables of contents to particular pages, but also as
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cross-references, footnotes, and new forms of information structure.
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Many organizations now have "home pages". These are documents which provide
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a set of links designed represent the organisation, and through links from
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the home page, guide the user directly or indirectly to information about
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or relevant to that organisation.
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As an example of the use of links, if this affidavit were to be put on a
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World Wide Web site, it's home page might contain links such as these:
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<UL>
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<LI>
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BACKGROUND OF THE WORLD WIDE WEB
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<LI>
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PUBLISHING ON THE WORLD WIDE WEB
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<LI>
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DESIGN AND ARCHITECTURE OF THE WORLD WIDE WEB
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<LI>
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MEANS FOR PROTECTING CHILDREN FROM INAPPROPRIATE MATERIAL AND AVOIDING UNWANTED
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MATERIAL
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</UL>
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Each of these links takes the user of the site from the beginning of the
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affidavit, to the appropriate section within the document. Links may also
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take the user from the original Web site to another Web site on another computer
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connected to the Internet. These links from one computer to another, from
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one document to another across the Internet, are what unify the Web into
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a single body of knowledge, and what make the Web unique.
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<H2>
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PUBLISHING ON THE WORLD WIDE WEB
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</H2>
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<P>
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5. Publishing. The World Wide Web exists fundamentally as a platform through
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which individuals and organizations can communicate through shared information.
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When information is made available, it is said to be published on the web.
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Publishing on the Web simply requires that the "publisher" has a computer
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connected to the Internet and that the computer is running W3 server software.
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The computer can be a simple as a small personal computer costing less than
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$1500 dollars or as complex as a multi-million dollar mainframe computer.
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Many Web publishers chose instead to lease disk storage space from someone
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else who has the necessary computer facilities, eliminating the need for
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actually owning any equipment oneself.
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<P>
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6. The Web, as a universe of network accessible information, contains a variety
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of documents prepared with quite varying degrees of care, from the hastily
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typed idea, to the professionally executed corporate profile. The power of
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the web stems from the ability of a link to point to any document whatsoever
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its status or physical location. Like paper, the Web is a universal medium,
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with nothing built into its nature to constrain the organization or content
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when it is used.
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7. Information to be published on the web must also be formatted according
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to the rules of the Web standards. These standardized formats assure that
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all Web users who want to read the material will be able to view it in. Web
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standards are sophisticated and flexible enough that they have grown to meet
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the publishing needs of many large corporations, banks, brokerage houses,
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newspapers and magazine which now publish "online" editions of their material,
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as well as government agencies, and even courts, which use the Web to disseminate
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important information to the public. At the same time, Web publishing is
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simple enough that thousands of individual users and small community
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organizations are using the Web to publish their own personal "home pages,"
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the equivalent of individualized newsletters about that person or organization
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and available to everyone on the Web.
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<P>
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8. Web publishers have a choice to make their web sites open to the general
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pool of all Internet users, or close them, and thus make the information
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accessible only to those with advance authorization. Many publishers chose
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to keep their sites open to all in order to give their information the widest
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potential audience. In the event that the publishers chooses to maintain
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restrictions on access, this is generally accomplished by assigning specific
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user names and passwords as a prerequisite to access to the site. Or, in
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the case of Web sites maintained for internal use of one organization, access
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will only be allowed from other computers within that organization's local
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network. While these access restrictions are possible, there is no mechanism
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built into the World Wide Web which allows publishers to restrict access
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to adults alone, or to keep minors from accessing the publishers site.
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<P>
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9. Searching the Web. A variety of systems have developed which allow users
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of the Web to search particular information among all of the public sites
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that are part of the Web. Services such as Yahoo, Magellan, Altavista,
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Webcrawler, and Lycos are all services known as "search engines" which allow
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users to search for Web sites that contain certain categories of information,
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or to search for key words. For example, a Web user looking for the text
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of Supreme Court opinions would type the words "Supreme Court" into a search
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engine, and then be presented with a list of World Wide Web sites that contain
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Supreme Court information. This list would actually be a series of links
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to those sites. Having searched out a number of sites which might contain
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the desired information, the user would then follow each link, browsing through
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the information on each site, until the desired material is found. For many
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content providers on the Web, the ability to be found be these search engines
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is very important.
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<H2>
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DESIGN AND ARCHITECTURE OF THE WORLD WIDE WEB
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</H2>
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<P>
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9. Common standards. The Web links together disparate information on an ever
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growing number of Internet-linked computers by setting common information
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storage formats (HTML) and a common language for the exchange of Web documents
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(HTTP). Though the information itself may be in many different formats, and
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stored on computers which are not otherwise compatible, the basic Web standards
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provide a basic set of standards which allow communication and exchange of
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information. Despite that fact that numerous types of computers are used
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on the web, and the fact that many of these machines are otherwise incompatible,
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those who "publish" information on the Web are able to communicate with those
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who seek to access information with little difficulty because of these basic
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technical standards.
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<P>
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10. A distributed system with no centralized control. Running on tens of
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thousands of individual computers on the Internet, the Web is what is known
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as a distributed system. The Web was designed so that organizations with
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computers containing information can become part of the Web simply by attaching
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their computers to the Internet and running appropriate World Wide Web software.
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No single organization controls any membership in the Web, nor is there any
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centralized point from which individual web sites or services can be blocked
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from the Web. From a user's perspective, it may appear to be a single, integrated
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system, but in reality it has no centralized control point.
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<P>
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11. Contrast to closed databases. The Web's open, distributed, decentralized
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nature stands in sharp contrast to most information systems that have come
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before it. Private information services such as Westlaw, Lexis/Nexis, Dialog,
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etc. have contained large storehouses of knowledge, and, can be accessed
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from the Internet with the appropriate passwords and access software. However,
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these databases are not linked together into a single whole, as is the World
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Wide Web.
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<P>
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12. Success of Web in research, education, and political activities. It is
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my observation that the World Wide Web has become so popular because of its
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open, distributed, and easy-to-use nature. Rather than requiring those who
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seek information to purchase new software or hardware, and to learn a new
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kind of system for each new database of information they seek to access,
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the Web environment makes it easy for users to jump from one set of information
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to another. By the same token, the open nature of the Web makes it easy for
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publishers to reach their intended audiences without having to know in advance
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what kind of computer each potential reader has, and what kind of software
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they will be using.
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<H2>
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MEANS FOR PROTECTING CHILDREN FROM INAPPROPRIATE MATERIAL AND AVOIDING UNWANTED
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MATERIAL
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</H2>
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<P>
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13. World Wide Web community sees the need to enable parents to protect children.
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With the rapid growth of the Internet, the increasing popularity of the Web,
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and the existence of material online that may be inappropriate for children,
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the World Wide Web community saw the need to build systems that enable parents
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to control the material which comes into their homes and may be accessible
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to their children. The World Wide Web Consortium launched the PICS ("Platform
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for Internet Content Selection") program in order to develop technical standards
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that would support parents' ability to filter and screen material that their
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children see on the Web. Given the nature of the Web, PICS developers determined
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that the most effective point of control over the flow of content to children
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is at the user end of the information chain, rather than at the content provider
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end. User control, as implemented through the PICS standards, gives parents
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the means to select which content is appropriate for their own children,
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and which content should be blocked.
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<P>
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14. User control is more effective than information provider control because
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Web site operators who publish information have no ability to verify the
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age, or in many cases even the identity, of those who access the publisher's
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Web site.
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<P>
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15. No Age Verification Standards. At present, I am not aware of any methods
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in the technical standards that make up the World Wide Web which would enable
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a Web site operator or publisher to establish the age of a user attempting
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to access a Web site. Establishing age through credit card verification is
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burdensome for all Web site operators and not practical for those Web sites
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which do not otherwise have a commercial relationship with their users. I
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believe that non-commercial Web sites would be forced to shut down if required
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to check the ages of their users through credit card verification. Even
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commercial sites will face significant burden if credit card verification
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is required before all user access. The cost of each verification by a credit
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card clearinghouse is , I understand, between $1 and $2. Sites which have
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thousands or millions of 'hits' per day, will certainly face significant
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cost if such age verification is required.
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<P>
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16. The web was designed with a maximimum target time to follow a link of
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one tenth of a second. Response times greater than this have been shown to
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reduce human effectiveness in solving problems when using systems of linked
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information. Practical web document retrieval times are currently between
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that and a few seconds. When rating the usability of the web, users have
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in a recent survey indicated that speed of access is their foremost concern.
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<P>
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17. The Web is a international system: an example of one of its many uses
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is the provision of health information to developing countries. Any system
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of adult verification would need to work efficiently internationally.
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<P>
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I declare under penalty of perjury that the foregoing is true and correct.
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<PRE>
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</PRE>
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<ADDRESS>
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Timothy J Berners-Lee
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<P>
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Date: 28 February 1996
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</ADDRESS>
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