Berners-Lee Wants MPs To Learn Coding

Sir Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the World Wide Web, claims more politicians need to have coding abilities to effectively legislate on technology.

The Internet’s founding father made the comments the UK newspaper The Guardian’s Every Second Counts Forum earlier this week.

“Being able to code means that you understand what people can do with a computer. You need to be able to understand what people can do with a computer to make laws about it,” claimed Berners-Lee.

He believes that is crucial that MPs appreciate the technical capabilities of computers and knowledge of coding is essential for this.

“We need more people in Parliament who can code, not because we need them to spend their time coding, but because they have got to understand how powerful a weapon it is, so that they can make laws that require people to code to make machines behave in different ways,” Berners-Lee added.

“Start Them Young”

In September, the government introduced a new ICT curriculum for schools in England that requires children from age five and above to begin learning programming skills, a move the Web inventor has welcomed.

“We need to introduce people to coding early so that the people to whom it appeals can then get as much time to do it as they need and real excel,” Berners-Lee claimed.

“We need more people to have done coding to actually end up doing it for a living,” he added.

The Internet’s inventor is very vocal about the future of the World Wide Web and the part the government has to play.

In March, he called for a web “Magna Carta” and more recently has spoken about the “right to be forgotten” and security.

© 24N.biz