FACT:
The World Wide Web
is a global network of connected computer networks.
Think of the Web like a big electronic brain. There are connections from
everywhere to everywhere, and information is zipping around all over the
place.
All you have to do is get connected, and you'll have the ride of your life.
Cool!
FACT:
1969--The first node (a computer system) on the Web is installed (at the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA)). The U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) wanted scientists to study what kind of networks could survive nuclear attack....
1969-- (drum roll) ARPANET, the name of this DoD network and the forerunner of the Internet, is born.
FACT:
1971--15 ARPANET nodes
(aka "hosts") in place, all of them in the United States.
1973--The first international connections are established (between Norway and England)
Through the 1970s and 1980s several other networks are developed (USENET,
MILNET, BITNET, CSNET, Minitel, EUNet, FidoNet, JANET, NSFNET, etc.)
FACT:
1982--ARPA lays down the rules of the road (aka "protocols"--TCP/IP) for communicating over the Internet, thus making it possible for the Internet (an INTERconnected set of NETworks) to exist.
1982-- (another drum roll) The Internet is born.
FACT:
1984--Number of Internet
"hosts" breaks 1000
1987--Number of Internet "hosts" breaks 10,000
1988--The nasty Internet "worm" strikes, and gobbles up the memory on thousands
of computers worldwide.
1988--CERT (Computer Emergency Response Team) formed to keep a wary eye
on worms and other villainous viruses (Spiders, Wanderers, Crawlers, and
Snakes, for example).
1989--Number of Internet "hosts" breaks 100,000. Whoa!!! But we ain't seen
nothin' yet (yawn...).
FACT:
1991-- (yet another
drum roll!) The Internet gives birth to The World Wide Web
(Developed by a gentleman named Tim Berners-Lee
at CERN in Geneva, Switzerland).
1992--Number of Internet "hosts" breaks 1
million--starting to get interesting!
1999--Number of Internet "hosts" is now close to 40 million
2002--Number of Internet "hosts" is now over 160 million and counting. That's quadruple what it was 3 years ago; and there's no end in sight! Here's the Kicker: the number of users is doubling about every 6 months (which really can't go on forever...)
The current "best" estimate of actual users (each "host" has a whoooole bunch of users) is around 2 billion. Hold on to your hats, ladies and gentlemen!
