AUSTIN, Texas—There were no baby pictures taken 10 years ago during the birth of the first official Web site at The University of Texas at Austin as one of the first 125 such sites in the world. Nobody expected the Web to grow so rapidly to such a monstrous size and its creators never imagined the historical significance of what they were doing.
A decade later now, the university is making sure its Web history and “Webpioneers” are not forgotten. The university and its School of Informationwill host a celebration at 2 p.m. Friday (June 6) honoring members of the universitycommunity who helped to transform a computer named “Bongo” into itsfirst official Web server on June 7, 1993. The celebration in the Avaya Auditoriumon the first floor of the ACES Building, corner of Speedway and 24th Street,is open to the public.
The centerpiece of Friday’s ceremony will be public recognition of 10 staff members as “Web Pioneers” in the creation and evolution of the Web at The University of Texas at Austin. They are:
- Mark McFarland, General Libraries
- David Cook, Information Technology Services
- John Wheat, Office of the Vice President for Resource Development
- Dennis Dillon, General Libraries
- Paul Rascoe, General Libraries
- Mary Lynn Rice-Lively, associate dean, School of Information
- Marg Knox, Information Technology Services
- Bill Bard, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
- Sue Phillips, General Libraries
- Mic Kaczmarczik, Information Technology Services
The contributions of other university “pioneers,” as well as some who have moved on from the university to other institutions or companies, will be recognized in future celebrations, said Philip Doty, an associate professor in the School of Information and an organizer of the event.
Doty said the ceremony is in conjunction with the WWW@UT Project, an ongoing effort by the School of Information to create an online video oral history archive of narratives about the evolution of the World Wide Web at The University of Texas at Austin. Special emphasis is on collecting the stories of staff members who have been and continue to be integral to the success of the Web here at the university.
“This archive will be publicly available on the Web in a wide variety of accessible formats for use by future scholars in their study of this important development in human communication,” Doty said.
For more information contact: Philip Doty, School of Information, 512-471-3746, or Robert D. Meckel, Office of Public Affairs, 512-471-3151.
