Discovery Channel has started a new series called Download: The True Story of the Internet. Not a long series; it’s basically about the story of the World Wide Web since it’s beginning till now. The major bits, that is. I saw the first episode, which was about the IE-Netscape browsers wars – and it was quite fun. Of course, everyone has heard of the huge ‘e’ the IE team left in front of Netscape’s office, but watching actual pictures and hearing about the whole incident from the defiler and the defilee makes an interesting watch.
What really caught my attention though was the show’s host. He’s some tech journalist, who wears an attire like Bruce Willis in Die Hard 4; is bald, again like Bruce Willis; and even sports a stubble exactly like Bruce Willis’ look in Die Hard 4. He doesn’t do much, except keep walking out of street corners into the camera’s field of vision (with a Bruce Willis type swagger) talking about key bits of the story. The punch line? His name is John Heilemann. Aw shucks. Discovery should’ve stuffed him with wads of cash to make him officially change his name to John McLane, just for fun. After all, they Discovery does have a LOT of money (they blew up three jet planes).
The series is worth watching. With a title like Download: The True Story of the Internet, it would truly be ironic if they try to stop people from downloading this from peer-to-peer networks (the pirates can always claim innocence by saying they were doing what the title said).