Virtual Revolution (BBC, 2010)

• Tim Berners Lee -> Invented the internet -> around about 2 billion people are now online -> free for people to use, no profit made -> Decentralised  
• Digital Divide - split between digital haves and digital have nots 
• Al Gore -> refers to the internet as an empowering tool, 'exciting and revolutionary'
• billion pounds a week -> spent on the internet (e-commerce)
• 5 million users use dating sites and 18 million reading blogs (mainly west london) 
• Internet revolution -> Identical to industrial revolution
• 65 million users around the world use Wikipedia -> challenges authority -> people power -> allows ordinary people to shape information -> Accuracy!?!
• 6th august 1991 -> first website launched, 1965 -> Email started
• MITS -> created first computer, Altair 8800
• Microsoft owned 90% of the market -> pressurised company's to have computers with windows software preinstalled
• Shaun Fanming -> Owner of Napster -> allowed others to share music online for free -> global piracy -> Metallica one of the bands enraged by Napster
• Chad Hurley -> CEO and co-owner of youtube -> youtube allows creative freedom, allows everyone to be seen -> Pluralism, UCG
• Ebay 21 million hits a month , Amazon 16 million hits a month, 1/3 people have a Facebook page
• Jimmy Whales (Co founder of Wikipedia) ->editors can lock and administrators can delete -> CENSORSHIP -> due to pressure/struggle by police
• Is the web unequal?!? -> Does it mirror hierarchy in the real world
• Web can be seen as a space of perpetual innovation -> provides extraordinary opportunities
• ^ BINARY OPPOSITION, GOOD VS EVIL