If you are reading this article and everything else online then it's all because of the World Wide Web, had it not been there things would have been a lot different and the world wouldn't have changed for the better.

Well, today marks the 25th birthday of the World Wide Web (Yes... Happy B'day, World Wide Web) and on this occasion its inventor Sir Tim Berners-Lee is calling on people like you and me to take action this year to keep the online resource open, global, accessible and free of censorship.

According to a blog post that Sir Tim Berners-Lee shared with Google, "Today is the web's 25th birthday. On March 12, 1989, I distributed a proposal to improve information flows: 'a web of notes with links between them'. Though CERN, as a physics lab, couldn't justify such a general software project, my boss Mike Sendall allowed me to work on it on the side. In 1990, I wrote the first browser and editor. In 1993, after much urging, CERN declared that WWW technology would be available to all, without paying royalties, forever".

Sir Tim Berners-Lee urged the readers by saying, "On the 25th birthday of the web, I ask you to join in—to help us imagine and build the future standards for the web, and to press for every country to develop a digital bill of rights to advance a free and open web for everyone. Learn more at webat25.org, and speak up for the sort of web we really want with #web25".

There's no doubt that things are a lot more different than how they were when the World Wide Web was first invented in 1989. According to a recent research conducted by the Pew Research Center that has looked in the usage of internet since the inception of the World Wide Web. From 1.4% of Americans reporting they use the Internet in the earliest study in 1983, now 87% report using it in 2014. The percentage rises to 99% for those living in households earning $75,000 or more, 99% amongst 18-29 year olds and 97% for those with college degrees.

Here's an interesting infographic by CWCS that looks back at the phenomenal growth of the World Wide Web and the way it has changed our lives. Have a look:

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