It's huge, it's sprawling, it's globe spanning, it's become part of our lives, it must be ... the Internet. We all know something about it, and most of us have tried to use it, with more or less success. (If you've had less, you've come to the right place.) In this chapter, we look at what the Internet is and what it can do before we dive into details in the rest of book.

If you're new to the Internet, and especially if you don't have much computer experience, be patient with yourself. Many of the ideas here are completely new. Allow yourself some time to read and reread. The Internet is a different world with its own language, and it takes some getting used to.

Even experienced computer users can find the Internet more complex than other things they've tackled before. The Internet is not a single software package, and it doesn't easily lend itself to the kind of step-by-step instructions we would provide for a single, fixed program. This book is as step-by-step as we can make it, but the Internet resembles a living organism mutating at an astonishing rate more than it resembles Microsoft Word or Excel, which sit quietly on your computer. After you get set up and get a little practice, using the Internet seems like second nature; in the beginning, however, it can be daunting.

Okay, So What Is the Internet?

The Internet - also known as the Net - is the world's largest computer network. "What is a network?" you may ask. Even if you already know, you may want to read the next couple of paragraphs to make sure that we're speaking the same language.

A computer network is a bunch of computers hooked together to communicate somehow. In concept, it's sort of like a radio or TV network that connects a bunch of radio or TV stations so that they can share the latest episode of American Idol.

But don't take the analogy too far. TV networks send the same information to all the stations at the same time (it's called broadcast networking); usually, in computer networks, each particular message is routed to a particular computer, so different computers can display different things. Unlike TV networks, computer networks are invariably two-way: When computer A sends a message to computer B, B can send a reply back to A.

Some computer networks consist of a central computer and a bunch of remote stations that report to it (for example, a central airline-reservation computer with thousands of screens and keyboards in airports and travel agencies). Other networks, including the Internet, are more egalitarian and permit any computer on the network to communicate with any other computer. Many new wireless devices - mobile phones, Palm Pilots, Blackberries, and their ilk - are linked to the Net, expanding the reach of the Internet to our very persons.

The Internet isn't really one network - it's a network of networks, all freely exchanging information. The networks range from the big and formal (such as the corporate networks at AT&T, General Motors, and Hewlett-Packard) to the small and informal (such as the one in John's back bedroom, made from a couple of old PCs bought at an electronics parts store) and everything in between. College and university networks have long been part of the Internet, and now high schools and elementary schools are joining in. Lately, computers and the Internet have become so popular that more and more households have more than one computer and are creating their own networks at home from which they connect to the Internet.

So What's All the Hoopla?

Everywhere you turn, you can find traces of the Internet. Household products, business cards, radio shows, and movie credits list their Web site addresses (usually starting with "www" and ending with "dot com") and their e-mail addresses. New people you meet would rather give you an e-mail address than a phone number. Everyone seems to be "going online" and "Googling it." Are they really talking about this same "network of networks"? Yes, and there's more.

The Internet affects our lives on a scale as significant as the telephone and television. When it comes to disseminating information, the Internet is the most significant invention since the printing press. If you use a telephone, write letters, read a newspaper or magazine, or do business or any kind of research, the Internet can radically alter your worldview.

With networks, size counts a great deal: The larger a network is, the more stuff it has to offer. Because the Internet is the world's largest interconnected group of computer networks, it has an amazing array of information to offer.

When people talk about the Internet, they usually talk about what they can do, what they have found, and whom they have met. Millions of computers connected to the Internet exchange information in a bunch of different ways. The number and type of available services are so expansive that we don't have room to give a complete list in this chapter, but here's a quick summary:

WORLD WIDE WEB

REMEMBER

The software used to navigate the Web is known as a browser. The most popular browsers today are Firefox and Internet Explorer. We tell you all about them in Chapter 6.

A Few Real-Life Stories

Seventh-grade students in San Diego use the Internet to exchange letters and stories with kids in Israel. Although it's partly just for fun and to make friends in a foreign country, a sober academic study reported that when kids have a real audience for their stuff, they write better. (Big surprise.)

For many purposes, the Internet is the fastest and most reliable way to move information. In September 1998, when special prosecutor Kenneth Starr delivered his report on the scandal involving President Clinton and Monica Lewinsky to the U.S. House of Representatives, the House quickly put the report online, thus allowing millions of people to read it the day it came out. (We can still debate whether it was a good idea to do that, but the Internet is what made it possible.) And Matt Drudge's Drudge Report online gossip sheet broke much of the scandal first.

In the hours and days following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, people gave up on the overloaded phone system (cell phones were particularly useless) and turned to e-mail to find out whether their loved ones and coworkers had survived. The Web provided folks in the United States with news coverage from all over the world, thus allowing Americans a glimpse at how the rest of the world saw the situation.

During the Iraq war, soldiers and civilians have kept in touch with friends and relatives by e-mail. One young man in Baghdad kept a widely read weblog (or blog - see Chapter 18) that gave people all over the world a view of the lead up to the war.

Medical researchers around the world use the Internet to maintain databases of rapidly changing data. People with medical conditions use the Internet to communicate with each other in support groups and to compare experiences.

Forward-thinking physicians make themselves available to their patients via e-mail and encourage their patients to use e-mail instead of the phone for non-emergency questions.

The Internet has more prosaic uses, too. Here are some from our personal experiences:

The Internet has local and regional parts, too. When John wanted to sell a trusty but tired pickup truck, a note on the Internet in a local for-sale area found a buyer within two days. Margy's husband sold his used computer within a half-hour of posting a message in the relevant Usenet newsgroup. Carol checks local movie listings and cultural events faster and more comprehensively than looking in the paper.

Why Is This Medium Different from Any Other Medium?

The Internet is unlike all the other communications media we've ever encountered. People of all ages, colors, creeds, and countries freely share ideas, stories, data, opinions, and products.

Anybody can access it

One great thing about the Internet is that it's probably the most open network in the world. Thousands of computers provide facilities that are available to anyone who has Internet access. Older networks limited what users could do and required specific arrangements for each service, but the Internet connects everyone to everything. Although pay services exist (and more are added every day), most Internet services are free for the taking after you're online. If you don't already have access to the Internet through your company, your school, your library, or a friend's attic, you probably have to pay for access by using an Internet service provider (ISP). We talk about some ISPs in Chapter 4.

It's politically, socially, and religiously correct

Another great thing about the Internet is that it is what one may call "socially unstratified." That is, one computer is no better than any other, and no person is any better than any other. Who you are on the Internet depends solely on how you present yourself through your keyboard. If what you say makes you sound like an intelligent, interesting person, that's who you are. It doesn't matter how old you are or what you look like or whether you're a student, a business executive, or a construction worker. Physical disabilities don't matter - we correspond with deaf and blind people. If they hadn't felt like telling us, we never would have known. People become famous (and infamous) in the Internet community through their own efforts.

The Net advantage

The Internet has become totally mainstream, and you're falling further behind the curve - and at a faster rate - if you haven't yet gotten started. Increasingly, news gets out on the Internet before it's available any other way, and the cyber-deprived are losing ground.

Here are some of the ways people use the Internet:

Continues...

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Excerpted from The Internet for Dummies with CDROM by John R. Levine Copyright © 1997 by John R. Levine. Excerpted by permission.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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