Who Owns The Web
For something that we all use, all the time, the Internet is a phenomenon that most of us are pretty ignorant about.
What even is it? Basically, the Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks. It’s not exactly a tangible entity, but rather a myriad of connections that rely on physical infrastructure to function.
Who owns it? There isn’t a single person that owns the Internet, but there are many businesses, institutions, organizations, corporations, governments, schools and people that own parts of it.
Before anyone can grasp who owns what, one first needs to understand what there is to own, and how Internet ownership is governed and organized. We can’t fit it all on a single page of a newspaper, but here are some of the key players you should know about.
The Internet Engineering Task Force: Their job is to ensure that the Internet operates smoothly. They do so by producing relevant documents that aim to influence how the web is designed, used, and managed.
The IETF separates their work into eight distinct areas: Applications, General, Internet, Operations and Management, Routing, Real-Time Applications and Infrastructure and Transport. They deal with the web from an engineering perspective, and leave business and policy matters to the other guys.
Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Number: ICANN’s vision is pretty simple: one world, one Internet. What the organization does in technical terms is manage the Domain Name System and Internet Protocol addresses.
Think of computers just like houses and buildings, each with their unique addresses—and think of ICANN as a large-scale form of virtual directions that allows computers to know how to reach one another. Control of this used to belong to the United States government—not anymore.
World Wide Web Consortium: This organization wants to make sure the web reaches its full potential, and are led by the developer of the World Wide Web, Tim Berners-Lee.
W3C basically controls the way the Internet looks by maintaining Hypertext Markup Language and Cascading Style Sheets, the heart and soul of the Internet. They offer some great free tutorials on anything website related.
Google: You know this one; it’s been everyone’s go-to for a long time. They are the largest online ad seller worldwide. They also can boast about the fact that they operate the Internet’s top search engine, and produce the Android operating system.
Internet Assigned Numbers Authority: They were around even before ICANN came into the picture, but now they are a department falling under the ICANN umbrella, they work to serve there needs.
IANA is somewhat of an Internet institution that’s been around since the ‘70s (in Internet years, that’s pretty much forever). They deal with domain names, number resources and protocol assignments.
Apple: With a market cap larger than Google and Microsoft combined, Apple dominates the tech consumer market. Throw in iTunes and their web browser Safari, and the company also rules over some of the most trafficked and profitable parts of the Internet.
As more users turn to the tablet for their online experience, Apple’s power over our browsing habits grows indefinitely with the iPad.
Yahoo!: While the average user may think Yahoo is only a web giant of ancient lore, the company still acts as a major player on the ‘net. Besides their email, search engine and news site, Yahoo! owns Flickr, the popular photo-sharing site.
Plus, while some online some giants are just realizing that there’s gold in tracking and storing user data, Yahoo! has been squirreling away their client’s habits for years; in 2007, The New York Times found that the company far outpaced their competitors in this respect.
Since then, however, Yahoo! has actually introduced a ‘Do Not Track’ feature that allows users to opt-out of the tracking.
Microsoft: Meet the producers of the world’s most used operating system—Windows. They can also take credit for Bing, the search engine, and the Xbox 360. You can thank Bill Gates, Microsoft’s famous co-founder, for saving your long-distance relationship—they now own Skype too.
