An Introduction to Internet

An Introduction to Internet
© by Maurizio Bisogno 2003

The Internet is the biggest revolution in the communication and information era. Internet is millions of computers connected to each other via phone lines and also via satellite. The content of Internet consists of everything that is information-related and can be transmitted and stored as text, image, video and audio: i.e. in all the electronic forms information can be stored. As I am writing more than 200 millions people are connected in this worldwide network, accessing all kind of information products.It also means that nearly in every corner of this planet there are computers connected or potentially connected to the each other.

You need therefore a computer with modem and Internet Browser software to access this information world. When you have provided yourself with that you need to dial in an Internet Service Provider, which will allow you to access the whole web through its servers.

The Internet Browser has several commercial names and appearances, like Internet Explorer, Netscape, Opera and Monzilla. The windows that opens when you launch the Internet Browser has at least a blank field in which you can enter the web address of the page you are looking for; at least a window to show you the content of the page and some basic buttons to go back and forward among pages, or scroll up and down on the same page. Every Internet page has a unique address called URL, which stands for Unique Resource Locator. This is the unique address of a web page; like your house, any page on Internet has a unique address, which appears like this: www.nameofthewebpage.com or .org, .us, .de, .org.

Imagine that you can chat with your pal in Australia, or China or Japan or California in real time at the cost of a local call: this is one of the numerous usages you can make of the Internet. When your local is too small for you, you can get global – you can reach the most remote computer on earth.

What said above is just to show you how powerful the World Wide Web can be in making the world smaller. Communication and Information are then the two words that will certainly put you on the right track when trying to understand what Internet is. Information and communication supported by computers and phone lines or satellites: this is what keeps Internet alive. But without you, the Internet USER, all this wouldn’t have any sense.

As it allows you to communicate information, Internet is not only a place of ideas, but also a place of action. This means that you can do your shopping through the Internet; you can actually buy anything you would in a normal shop down the road. And of course, you could open your commercial web site where you could sell to the world your special product. One of the biggest mistakes is to believe that you can only sell information via the web. That’s wrong. You put on your web site information that sells, and it would sell products which are non-information products, but 3D objects existing outside the web page or services to be provided outside the world wide web.

One of the interesting usages you can make of the Internet is banking. You can access your own bank account, view statement and even manage your funds, paying bills or receiving money.

The aim of this article is not to list all that you can do, but to give you a hint of what you can do over the Internet. You are sitting at your computer in own room, or office, anywhere in the world and it wouldn’t make a difference to you where the information you are accessing is physically located.

In order to have an Internet Experience of a certain quality you need to take care of some technical factors together with some basic knowledge. In the first place, speed is a key factor: how fast is your connection to your ISP? This is a crucial point. Generally speaking information travels in seconds from one corner of the world to the other; where you may experience the slow down is in the segment that goes from your computer to your ISP. This is why you should have a good phone line connection – ISDN or Broadband, via cable or satellite. In this way your Internet experience is fully enjoyable.

Once your speed connection is satisfactorily solved, you need to know what you are looking for over the Internet and how to find it, if you wish to make your Internet experience productive and worthwhile. I cannot tell you what you should look for, but I can give you some indication on how to find it.

You need to use a search engine like Google, Altavista, Lycoos and others. A search engine is usually appearing to you as a webpage containing at least a title, a blank field and a button to launch the search. You need to type in your Internet browser the URL of one of these web pages. When you open your Internet Browser – Internet Explorer, Netscape, Monzilla, or Opera or some other – you type in the Address field the URL of the search engine page you wish to access.

In the case of a search engine like Google, you would type www.google.com. Hit the Go button and the Google page with a blank field will appear to you. Now, enter in the blank field the description of what you are looking for and hit button that launches the search. The results of your search will usually appear in few seconds: a list of web pages titles, descriptions and links will be the new page on your screen. If what your looking for is listed, click on the page name and you will be brought there. This also means that that title is a link; as such you do not have to type manually the URL of that address but it will bring you automatically there once you click on it.

Generally speaking you can search for virtually every imaginable information that can be put electronically put into text, image, video and audio. Just imagine how useful would be for a student to have available at any time and nearly everywhere all kind of information about his/her subject.

What about that e-mail you had to send to your friend? Indeed your e-mail campaign to advertise the launch of your last product is due to start today. And what about that song you wanted to download and the last clips from that movie your friend just produced? On the other hand you might just want to chat with somebody about some difficulties you are having in your activity- so you will find some newsgroups that have as main topic your activity and you can ask for help by posting a message with your request. And of course you can participate to a discussion topic with your own messages.

There is point that I like to stress: Internet is interactive and this means that you’re not passively receiving information, but you constantly choose what info you want to access. From digital photography printing to listening to your favourite radio; from the web camera installed on your front door you can watch who is ringing your door bell… the only difference that you are sitting at the in your hotel room.

The Internet makes certainly the world smaller – Knowledge becomes more and accessible. Even though the most popular language over the net is English, a growing number of web sites are available in all other languages.

If you are missing the Internet experience, you are missing more than just a trendy event. So you have a computer connected to an ISP via a fast speed connection; you have a basic understand of what an Internet Browser is and you know some basics about the Search Engine: what are you waiting for? Start you navigation, follow the path to your object and enjoy the revolutionary experience that is Internet today for you.

Maurizio Bisogno, graduate in philosophy and former IT Professional,is the author of several publications and translations.
http://www.mauriziobisogno.com
mailto:me@mauriziobisogno.com

P.S. I have created an e-book containing the all series of The 12+1 Secrets to Become a High Achiever.
So if you wish to have the content in one e-book, easy to open and read just click on the link below

click me to order

http://www.mauriziobisogno.com
Feel free to contact me if you need any other explanation or help.

Yours
Maurizio Bisogno
TRTW Editor

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