[EN] Paul Treanor (Netherlands)
#Created on his personal website a section on the future of languages in Europe
Created in 1996, this website is divided into six sections: Net/cyberspace
ideology; geopolitics/nationalism; the future of Europe; urban theory/planning;
liberalism and ethics; and academic issues. For legal reasons, some pages with a
high risk of legal action are only located at the duplicate website. In this
way, if the second website is closed down the first can continue operating.
Paul Treanor also writes articles for Telopolis, a German online magazine.
[Interview 18/08/1998 // Interview 25/07/1999]
*Interview of August 18, 1998
= How do you see the growth of a multilingual Web?
You speak of the Web in the singular. As you may have read (on my website), I
think "The Web" is a political, not a technological concept. A civilization is
possible with extremely advanced computers, but no interconnection. The idea
that there should be "one Web" comes from the liberal tradition of the single,
open, preferably global market.
The Internet should simply be broken up in multiple Nets, and Europe should cut
the links with the US and build a systematically incompatible net for Europe.
(...) Remember that 15 years ago, everyone thought there would be one global TV
station, CNN. Now there are French, German and Spanish global TV channels.
So the answer to your question is that the "one Web" will split up anyway --
probably into these four components:
1. An internal US/Canadian anglophone Net, with many of the original
characteristics