The “Internet” and “World Wide Web” Defined In recent years the Internet
and World Wide Web (WWW) have become more and more popular as an information
resource. Many people believe that the WWW is the same as the Internet. This is
untrue. The Internet was designed in the late 60’s as a way for a few military
computers to exchange research data. Today, the Internet has evolved into a
loose association of thousands of networks and millions of computers around the
world. These networks are connected together using high-speed communication
lines. Primarily, the millions of computers that access these networks use
slower speed data connections and telephone dial-up connections. The WWW is
actually a program that runs on the Internet. It’s a collection of interlinked
documents that work together using a special computer language called a
protocol. This language allows millions of web documents, or “pages”, to be
accessed instantly with a click of a button. These documents can include, text,
color, sounds, pictures and even movies. The Internet is essentially the
hardware that connects all of the computers together. It consists of special
computers that’s sole purpose is to move data at high speeds between other
computers. The World Wide Web is a piece of software that runs on the Internet.
It’s the actual information that is available on the Internet. Essentially,
The Internet can function without the Web, but the Web cannot function without
the Internet.