On August 6, 1991, British computer scientist Tim Berners-Lee took one of the decisive steps in the history of modern technology. Working at CERN near Geneva, he published information about his World Wide Web project on the internet discussion group alt.hypertext, helping introduce the technology to a much wider audience beyond the scientific community.
In 2026, the Web marks 35 years since that public announcement, although its story began several years earlier.
In 1989, Berners-Lee proposed a system that would allow scientists working at different institutions to easily share and connect information stored on different computers. By the end of 1990, he had developed the fundamental technologies behind the Web, including HTML, HTTP, and the system of web addresses known as URLs.
The world’s first website was created at CERN and hosted on a NeXT computer, which also served as the first web server. The website was remarkably simple. It explained what the World Wide Web was, how people could create web pages, and how information could be discovered through hyperlinks.
The Internet and the World Wide Web Are Not the Same Thing
Today, the terms “internet” and “Web” are frequently used interchangeably, but technically they describe different things.
The internet is the global infrastructure—a vast system of interconnected computers, servers, routers, undersea cables, mobile networks, and satellite connections capable of exchanging data.
The World Wide Web is one of the services operating on that infrastructure. It is the system of websites, pages, images, videos, and hyperlinks that people access through browsers such as Chrome, Safari, Firefox, and Edge.
Put simply, the internet is the network, while the Web is an information system that runs on that network.
Email, for example, uses the internet but is not itself part of the World Wide Web. The internet also existed before the Web was created.
The Decision That Helped the Web Conquer the World
Another crucial moment came on April 30, 1993, when CERN made the World Wide Web technology freely available. Developers, universities, companies, and individuals could build websites and servers without paying licensing fees for the core technology.
That decision helped the Web expand at extraordinary speed.
What began as a simple information page at CERN gradually evolved into a global system supporting news media, social networks, e-commerce, streaming services, online banking, education, government services, and a significant part of the modern global economy.
Tim Berners-Lee did not invent the internet. His achievement was the creation of the World Wide Web and a universal way of connecting and easily accessing information across the internet.
Just 35 years after the project’s public announcement, it is difficult to imagine modern life without it. From a single website at CERN to the enormous digital landscape of today, the World Wide Web has become one of the technologies that most profoundly transformed human society.
Sources: CERN, World Wide Web Consortium, Internet Society.
