Our vision
To achieve our vision to make the web work — for everyone, we uphold the following core values:
- The web is for all humanity.
- The web is designed for the good of its users.
- The web must be safe for its users.
- There is one interoperable world-wide web.
Our identity
- We are an open forum where diverse voices from around the world and industries come together, incubate and build consensus for global standards for web technologies.
- We are socially responsible and committed to ensure that the web is for everyone; we greatly emphasize accessibility, internationalization, privacy, and security.
- We are committed to developing open and royalty-free standards with high focus on interoperability and collective empowerment.
Our design principles
To guide the community to build a better web, W3C Members have enshrined in the form of "W3C Statements" the following principles in order to provide a stable reference for documents not intended to be formal standards, but have been formally reviewed and are endorsed by W3C.
The Web Consortium follows these essential design principles.
Web for all
The social value of the web is that it enables human communication, commerce, and opportunities to share knowledge. One of W3C's primary goals is to make these benefits available to all people, and for that technology needs to be developed sustainably, striving for balance between economic growth, social well-being and environmental protections. It is critical for W3C to ensure on the one hand that we build a web that conserves environmental resources, and on the other hand that supports people and society by ensuring the benefits of the web are available to all people. The technologies we develop must reflect our commitment to diversity and inclusion of participants from different geographical locations, cultures, languages, disabilities, gender identities, and more. Learn more about:
Web of trust
The web has transformed the way we communicate with each other. In doing so, it has also modified the nature of our social relationships. People now meet on the web and carry out commercial and personal relationships, in some cases without ever meeting in person. W3C recognizes that trust is a social phenomenon, but technology design can foster trust and confidence. As more activity moves online, it will become even more important to support complex interactions among parties around the globe. Learn more about:
Web on everything
The number of different kinds of devices that can access the web has grown immensely. Mobile phones, smart phones, interactive television systems, voice response systems, kiosks and even certain domestic appliances can all access the web. Learn about how the web transforms many business ecosystems, how the Web Consortium meets particular industry needs, and how everyone benefits:
W3C Founding Director Sir Tim Berners-Lee, web inventor, answers the question "What part of the World Wide Web Consortium's work are you most proud of?" in this video from the World Wide Web Foundation at the occasion of #WEB30