Berners-Lee: the original HTTP protocol

What changed

Early Web clients and servers could exchange hypertext documents through a minimal interoperable protocol.

Scientific scope

Original 1991 HTTP/0.9 as archived by W3C; no HTTP/1.0 features, later standards or broader Web project.

Evidence

The linked sources identify this contribution and its scope. WRS has not independently reconstructed the scientific claims. The record is the original 1991 protocol as archived by W3C. HTTP/1.0, later standardization, browser/server engineering and wider Web development have broader authorship.

Contributors

• Tim Berners-Lee · SCIENCE: Named source author of the scoped work; individual effort shares are not measured.

• W3C: The Original HTTP as defined in 1991
• W3C: Classic HTTP Documents

Provisional WRS assessment, edition 2026-10-16.1. Independent expert calibration is pending. This grade does not certify correctness or assign ownership.

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