Do you know what makes the Internet so great and important?
Even today most people don’t really understand why the Internet has become the economy’s infrastructure of the entire world over the last 30 years.
What is so special about this new technology?
And the answer is: because, for the first time ever, we’ve created an open, neutral, and permissionless platform for media and value distribution.
But what does this really mean?
Imagine you are watching the TV news and realize some information is not accurate. There are missing data and a lack of nuances, and also it could have a better explanation of underlying concepts.
So, you decide to just send your point of view with all missing information to the channel asking them to publish it. You attach the content with official data and a lot of references. Why wouldn’t they publish it, right?
But, how many times did you see this happening? How many people do you know who had the chance to talk on TV? Virtually zero.
Another example. You are obsessed with plants and have spent the last few months writing a detailed piece about several rare species. Wouldn’t it be nice to send it to other plant hobbyists or scientists? But, how to do it? Asking for publishing it on a TV channel? Writing a book? Trying to publish it at University? In a magazine?
All these channel distributions have a massive barrier to entry, becoming virtually impossible for regular people to access them.
And that’s because Traditional Media and other 20th-century Institutions all run on Closed Permissioned Platforms.
To be able to broadcast any content, you either need to be allowed to buy a TV channel license from the government or convince/pay a TV owner to publish your content, or have a good contact in a big magazine or newspaper.
However, just a very select group of powerful people has this privilege.
At least until the rising of the Internet.
The Internet ushered in a completely new paradigm. An open, neutral, and permissionless communication infrastructure where anyone can freely publish their contents.
OPEN | Everyone can use the technology. |
NEUTRAL | All content flows over the Internet without any content restriction, the same way post offices deliver your mail without checking what is inside the envelope. |
PERMISSIONLESS | No one can prevent you from using this technology. |
If the Internet had been born as a closed project, with CEO and shareholders, very few companies would be willing to build projects on top of it. What would happen if the board’s company changed the rules overnight? Or kick the company out of the platform?
But with Open, Permissionless, and Neutral protocols like SMTP (email), HTTP (Web browsers), and many others, every company (like Google, Amazon, Facebook, etc.) knows with certainty that the base infrastructure won’t change.
And these 3 simple properties, almost without meant it, changed the world forever.
Right now you can contract an internet service provider, buy a domain name, set up a web server on your personal computer (or rent someone else’s computer, aka hosting), and publish any website with whatever content you want. There is no need of asking permission from anyone or being afraid that your website will be turned off by the Internet CEO.
The Internet/Web has broken the Mainstream Media monopoly, allowing the flourishing of an unprecedented amount of innovation.