Vint Cerf on how freedom created the Internet
Thu, 03 Jul 2008 08:50:52 +0200
I am too tied up with other things to put much effort into blogging this week, so let me recycle an old one from the Digital Freedom Exposition site.
I wanted someone who had a profound impact on global innovation, yet whose impact had been achieved through a deep respect for what I am calling digital freedom. Vint Cerf, who co-created the protocol on which the Internet runs, and who is now Vice President and Chief Internet Evangalist at Google, was a natural. Watch his video and you will see why. Thankfully, he was willing to do it if we could get a professional film crew to record him, which they did in Washington DC. Sometimes the stars do align!
Here is an approximate rendition of the transcript.
Hello everyone. I am pleased to make this contribution to the Digital Freedom Exposition, being held at the University of the Western Cape, in Cape Town, South Africa. Keeping important things Free and Open has been vital to the development of the Internet, and is likely to be an valuable contributor to development in Africa because when core things are Free and Open there are no barriers to innovation.
When Bob Khan and I created TCP/IP, and a bunch of us built a platform for inter-networking, we did not patent the technologies used. We set TCP/IP free. If we had not done so, it is doubtful that the Internet as we know it today would have come into being. The Internet today is to a large extent a result of the freedom to innovate that it makes possible.
The principle purpose of the Internet Society, which I co-founded in 1992, is to assure that Internet is for Everyone! We strive to continue the development and to extend the availability of the Internet and its associated technologies and applications - both as ends in themselves, and as a means of enabling organizations, professions, and individuals worldwide to more effectively collaborate, cooperate, and innovate in their respective fields and interests.
Creativity and innovation are the success of the internet. People need to be able to innovate without asking permission of software vendors or ISPs or anyone else.
Freedom to innovate in a digital world is has the potential to allow young people in Africa to experiment and build new technologies, to create business opportunities, and to grow the economy. It is therefore fitting that this first Digital Freedom Exposition in Africa is taking place in a University with a history of dedicated work on other kinds of freedom, and that is collaborating strongly with other African universities to build capacity in Free Software engineering on the Continent.
South Africa is leading the way, with the new Government Strategy that promotes Free and Open Source Software and Open Content. I hope that the Digital Freedom Exposition is the start of something that keeps the focus on digital freedom, the opportunities it offers and the threats it faces. Africa needs innovation without boundaries.
Despite its operational existence since 1983, the Internet’s application space has barely been explored. There seems to be an endless array of potential ideas left to be considered, limited only by the imagination and our ability to produce the necessary software to make these ideas real. With digital freedom, there is no reason that the next big idea on the Internet cannot come out of Africa. Indeed, it is time for it.
And now I am going to hand you over to Bob Jolliffe, Founding Director of Freedom to Innovate South Africa, to talk to you about the threat of software patents.
When Bob Khan and I created TCP/IP, and a bunch of us built a platform for inter-networking, we did not patent the technologies used. We set TCP/IP free. If we had not done so, it is doubtful that the Internet as we know it today would have come into being. The Internet today is to a large extent a result of the freedom to innovate that it makes possible.
The principle purpose of the Internet Society, which I co-founded in 1992, is to assure that Internet is for Everyone! We strive to continue the development and to extend the availability of the Internet and its associated technologies and applications - both as ends in themselves, and as a means of enabling organizations, professions, and individuals worldwide to more effectively collaborate, cooperate, and innovate in their respective fields and interests.
Creativity and innovation are the success of the internet. People need to be able to innovate without asking permission of software vendors or ISPs or anyone else.
Freedom to innovate in a digital world is has the potential to allow young people in Africa to experiment and build new technologies, to create business opportunities, and to grow the economy. It is therefore fitting that this first Digital Freedom Exposition in Africa is taking place in a University with a history of dedicated work on other kinds of freedom, and that is collaborating strongly with other African universities to build capacity in Free Software engineering on the Continent.
South Africa is leading the way, with the new Government Strategy that promotes Free and Open Source Software and Open Content. I hope that the Digital Freedom Exposition is the start of something that keeps the focus on digital freedom, the opportunities it offers and the threats it faces. Africa needs innovation without boundaries.
Despite its operational existence since 1983, the Internet’s application space has barely been explored. There seems to be an endless array of potential ideas left to be considered, limited only by the imagination and our ability to produce the necessary software to make these ideas real. With digital freedom, there is no reason that the next big idea on the Internet cannot come out of Africa. Indeed, it is time for it.
And now I am going to hand you over to Bob Jolliffe, Founding Director of Freedom to Innovate South Africa, to talk to you about the threat of software patents.
tcp/ip internet digital freedom vint cerf history of technology
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