New Delhi, NFPost: The World Wide Web’s creator Tim Berners-Lee is auctioning off his invention’s source code as an NFT (non-fungible token). Berners-Lee, a London-born computer scientist, invented the World Wide Web in 1989, revolutionising the sharing and creation of information in what is seen as one of the most significant inventions since the printing press appeared in Europe in 15th Century Germany.
Berners-Lee’s 1989 invention of the World Wide Web went on to revolutionise how the world creates and shares information. The winning bidder for the World Wide Web source code, tied as NFT, will receive a letter from Tim Berners-Lee “reflecting on the code and the process of creating it.”
The original archive of dated and time-stamped files contains the source code, written between October 3, 1990, and August 24, 1991.
Approximately 9,555 lines of source code, which include implementations of HTML, HTTP and URIs. Written by British computer scientist Sir Tim Berners-Lee, will be tied to an NFT that proves the authenticity of the code and unique ownership, with bids starting at just $1,000.
In 1990 Berners-Lee has build an application he called “WorldWideWeb”. It was originally developed in Objective C programming language on a NeXT computer, founded by Apple founder Steve Jobs after his ouster from Apple.
Why an NFT? Well, it’s a natural thing to do … when you’re a computer scientist and when you write code and have been for many years,” Berners-Lee said in a statement. “It feels right to digitally sign my autograph on a completely digital artefact,” he added.
NFTs are digital files underpinned by blockchain technology – the same technology on which popular cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum rest. But unlike cryptocurrencies, an NFT is totally unique and the blockchain ledger it sits on verifies who the rightful owner is of that one-of-a-kind item.
