[Aths: Fyrirsögn þessa bloggs var áður "Til varnar höfundi Internetsins". En síðar um daginn fattaði ég að þessi væri miklu flottari.]

Remember, America, I gave you the Internet, and I can take it away!
- Al Gore í þætti David Letterman, september 2000.

Ekki það að ég sé endilega aðdáandi Al Gore. En það er semidapurlegt hvernig framlags hans til þróunar Internetsins er minnst í dag. Þar er sumsé átt við ummælin “Ég fann upp Internetið.” Maður sér þau rifjuð upp nokkuð reglulega, nú síðast hjá Frjálsumfrönskum.

Það er í sjálfu sér aukaatriði líka að hann sagðist aldrei hafa fundið upp netið. Orðrétt var kvótið hans:

During my service in the United States Congress I took the initiative in creating the internet. I took the initiative in moving forward a whole range of initiatives that have proven to be important to our country’s economic growth and environmental protection, improvements in our educational system.

Al Gore var byrjaður að sýna tölvusamskiptum áhuga á 8. áratugnum og var fyrsti kjörni fulltrúinn sem skildi hversu mikil áhrif þau gætu haft í framtíðinni.

Robert Kahn og Vinton Cerf, sem gætu líklega öðrum fremur með réttu kallast höfundar Internetsins, sendu löngu síðar frá sér yfirlýsingu vegna umræðunnar um Al Gore.

Al Gore was the first political leader to recognize the importance of the Internet and to promote and support its development. …

[A]s the two people who designed the basic architecture and the core protocols that make the Internet work, we would like to acknowledge VP Gore’s contributions as a Congressman, Senator and as Vice President. No other elected official, to our knowledge, has made a greater contribution over a longer period of time. …

[T]here is no question in our minds that while serving as Senator, Gore’s initiatives had a significant and beneficial effect on the still-evolving Internet. The fact of the matter is that Gore was talking about and promoting the Internet long before most people were listening. … He was the first elected official to grasp the potential of computer communications to have a broader impact than just improving the conduct of science and scholarship. …

When the Internet was still in the early stages of its deployment, Congressman Gore provided intellectual leadership by helping create the vision of the potential benefits of high speed computing and communication. …

Working in a bi-partisan manner with officials in Ronald Reagan and George Bush’s administrations, Gore secured the passage of the High Performance Computing and Communications Act in 1991.

Hér er síðan sá hluti yfirlýsingar þeirrar sem ég er af mörgum ástæðum hvað hrifnastur af:

As Vice President Gore promoted building the Internet both up and out, as well as releasing the Internet from the control of the government agencies that spawned it.

Hversu oft sjá menn stjórnmálamann fá svo mikið kredit frá jafnmerkum frumkvöðlum? Ég hef engu við það að bæta.

Nema því að mér finnst Internetið vera snilld. Og mér finnst Al Gore eiga betra skilið.

Birt 8.1.2007 - 11:31 | Ómálefnalegheit |