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For many of the geek faithful, the high point of last night’s Olympics opening ceremony was Tim Berners-Lee, father of the web, sending a tweet live in front of 27 million Britons and billions more across the world.

Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the World Wide Web,  deserved his place at the heart of the Olympic celebrations, and if I had my way would have lit the cauldron, possibly by emailing an instruction to a robot arm (of, if you want something more reliable and less complicated, David Beckham). I wrote a piece about the importance of Berners-Lee to the world here, perhaps the most important part of which is:

"With less of a commitment to openness, Berners-Lee could have used the Web to become a very rich man. Instead, he has used every accolade – Fellow of the Royal Society, Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire, one of only 22 holders of the Order of Merit and recipient of enough honorary doctorates to fill a skip – as a lever, opening doors for his mission to keep the channels of communication open, accessible and affordable."

Berners-Lee, founder of the World Wide Web Consortium, is co-Director of the new Web Science Research Initiative (WSRI) and Director of the World Wide Web Foundation.

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