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Goes right along with the multitude of conservative websites being hacked at the moment.....
Posted on 09/21/2008 12:22:44 PM PDT by Delacon
BBC News (09/15/08) Ghosh, Pallab
Sir Tim Berners-Lee is helping to create the World Wide Web Foundation, a new organization that will certify Web sites it finds to be trustworthy and a reliable source of information. Berners-Lee says there needs to be a new system that will give Web sites a label for trustworthiness once they have proven to be a reliable source. “On the Web the thinking of cults can spread very rapidly and suddenly a cult which was 12 people who had some deep personal issues suddenly find a formula which is very believable,” he says. “A sort of conspiracy theory of sorts and which you can imagine spreading to thousands of people and being deeply damaging.” Berners-Lee and colleagues at the World Wide Web consortium examined simple ways of branding Web sites, but concluded that a whole variety of different mechanisms are needed. In addition to creating a trustworthiness rating, the World Wide Web Foundation also will strive to make it easier for people to get online. Currently, only 20 percent of the world’s population has access to the Web. The foundation also will explore ways of making the Web more mobile-phone friendly, which will increase its use in Africa and other developing parts of the world where there are few computers but plenty of handheld devices. The foundation also will examine how the Web can be used to benefit those who cannot read or write. “We’re talking about the evolution of the Web,” Berners-Lee says. “When something is such a creative medium as the Web, the limits to it are our imagination.”
So what does this have to do with climate change, global warming, and our current state of fear? I guess it depends on who decides what is trustworthy and reliable, and what criteria they apply to make such decisions. Defining what a cult is, or isn’t, depends greatly on whether you are inside or outside that group. What defines a conspiracy?
Consider the ramification of sites like Climate Audit and Watts Up With That being rated as untrustworthy because they challenge the “consensus.” Or the effect of RealClimate being rated untrustworthy because it tows the party line. The holy grail would become certification as trustworthy and reliable rather than a pursuit of truth or presenting ideas for discussion. What political pressure will be placed on such a governing body to give favourable ratings to some sites and withhold such ratings from others just because they agree or disagree with the polemic at any given time? Where does the idea of free speech come into play? Organizations such as the UN could exert enormous pressure to effectively silence those who question the actions of certain UN bodies like the IPCC, or the WHO.
While I would like to see the WWW clean up it’s act, we could end up with a sterile cyberspace where only proper thought is allowable or tolerated. The current beauty of the WWW is that it allows for the free distribution of ideas. The current ugliness of the Web is that it allows for the free distribution of ideas.
In time, the Foundation could find that its efforts are counter productive. Sites that do not get the favoured status could become even more popular simply because they are outside the club. One thing the Web has shown is that people do not like to be told what to believe. Currently, there are an alarming number of conspiracy, cult, and porn sites on the Web. The people who frequent such sites are not likely to care what rating is applied. In the case of the pro-conspiracy crowd, such ratings would only strengthen their arguments. Even if they could stop the Web dissemination of “wrong” ideas like the Large Hadron Collider creating Earth-swallowing black holes or misinformation on health risks where none exist, they would not stop the same ideas from being spread through other channels like the tabloid media. Isn’t it better to get such ideas out in the open early so they can be refuted quickly? At any rate, people will believe what the wish to believe, trustworthiness of a site will have little effect on that.
Like climate change, we can only wait to see what comes next. Also like climate change, it may be just a tempest in a teapot.
ping
Pffftt!
Sir Tim Berners-Lee is proving once again that British de-Nazification programs really should have been applied to more folks than just Lord Haw Haw.
Click on POGW graphic for full GW rundown
New!!: Dr. John Ray's
GREENIE WATCH
Ping me if you find one I've missed.
Uh, huh. And the limits proposed by Berners-Lee and his World Wide Web Foundation.
The internet should be completely free of any regulation.
Period.
While I would like to see the WWW clean up it’s act...
Why? Why is the web seen as a homogenous entity which should measure up to some level or standard regarding what is found there? It seems this has become a standard view, and is reflected in many discussions or comments made on the TV (an old outdated and "one way street" information source) regarding the "danger" of "new media" such as blogs. Nobody ever seems to wonder or question why people are assuming that blogs, or anything else of that sort online, should be seen as related in any way to "old media."
The WWW is not a news source or an organization with a reputation to protect. It is like a library, in that it brings together many disparate pieces of information of vastly varying ranges of trustworthiness. It is up to the reader to be careful and avoid credulity, and not the library to impose something like that. In another way the WWW is nothing but the town square, or local tavern, where people meet to exchange ideas and thoughts. It is a massive international conversation really. Can you actually go around certifying conversations, or groups of people who are talking, making sure some of them are "trustworthy?" I doubt it, and why would you want to? That is not what such conversations are about really, and more important is the honesty and openness of the participants.
A healthy web is found the same way healthy relationships and discourses are, and that is not through external measurements and enforced certifications. If we would clear up our understanding of what the WWW is, then we could have a much better way of using it, and being a part of it in a way helpful to ourselves and others.
Well said.
Kind of like this?
Don’t give them any ideas. ;)
Web Trustworthyness-—part of the “change” coming from an Obama Administration.....
...part of the Fairness Doctrine legislation!
They can rate to their hearts content as long as they don’t try and regulate it.
that will certify Web sites it finds to be trustworthy and a reliable source of information.
And just what is supposed to make me believe Sir Tim's "certification" prowess? He sounds like just another government weenie trying to worm his way into the middle of a situation that in no way whatsoever requires his presence.
And I suppose he will be doing this from the kindness of his heart and there will not be so much as a suggestion of monetary compensation for his "needed" services?
Make no mistake. Berners-Lee, unlike Algore, is the actual inventer of the WWW. He is also the director of the World Wide Web Consortium. The reason you have to put .edu, .com, .biz at the end of any web address is because of these guys. They just said its so. Now Berners-Lee is going outside this organization to push his “legitimate” standard. This isn’t about rating, its about regulation.
“This isn’t about rating, its about regulation.”
I understand. I also think it is politically impossible to regulate the web.
“I also think it is politically impossible to regulate the web.”
All due respect, have we gotten any chinese nationals posting on FR? Have you found any anti-gov’t chinese websites? Why so?
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