Original Code Of World Wide Web Auctioned As NFT For $5.4 Million

The original source code of the internet (well, technically the world wide web) has been sold as a non-fungible token, or NFT at an auction for $5.4 million organised by Sotheby’s, to an anonymous bidder, as per a report by the Daily Mail.?

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The code was written by Sir Tim Berners-Lee, who is regarded as the father of the modern internet that has become an indispensable part of our lives. The bidding for the NFT commenced at $1,000 and attracted a total of 51 bids.

The anonymous bidder who won the bidding war to get a strand of the very first existence of the internet would be receiving four unique components as a part of this purchase.?

Firstly it would include the original archive of the code and files from October 3, 1990, to August 23, 1991.?He would also be the recipient of an animated video of the 9,555 lines of code that was being written in black and white. The silent black and white video lasts for a good 30 minutes and 25 seconds.?

He also received be a scalable vector graphics representation of the entire code, as well as a letter written by Sir Tim Berners-Lee. He says in the letter, “It is amazing to see the things that those relatively few lines of code, with a help of an amazing growing gang of collaborators across the planet, stayed enough on track to become what the web is now. I have never once felt I could relax and sit back - as the web and is constantly changing. It is not yet the best it can be: there is always work to be done!”

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The proceeds from this sale would go to the initiatives supported by him and his wife, Lady Rosemary Berners-Lee.

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Sir Tim said in a statement, “The process of bringing this NFT to auction has offered me the opportunity to look back in time to the moment I first sat down to write this code thirty years ago, and reflect on how far the web has come since then, and where it could go in the decades to come.”

He added, “I am thrilled that the initiatives Rosemary and I support will benefit from the sale of this NFT. I want to thank everyone that has worked on this project at Sotheby's and the Crypto Community for your help and support.”