internet \in"ter*net\ ([i^]n"t[~e]r*n[e^]t), n.
   A large network[3] of numerous computers connected through a
   number of major nodes of high-speed computers having
   high-speed communications channels between the major nodes,
   and numerous minor nodes allowing electronic communication
   among millions of computers around the world; -- usually
   referred to as the internet. It is the basis for the
   World-Wide Web.
   [PJC]

	

	Internet
     n : a computer network consisting of a worldwide network of
         computer networks that use the TCP/IP network protocols
         to facilitate data transmission and exchange [syn: Net,
          cyberspace]

	

	Internet n.The mother of all networks. First incarnated beginning in
   1969 as the ARPANET, a U.S. Department of Defense research testbed.
   Though it has been widely believed that the goal was to develop a
   network architecture for military command-and-control that could survive
   disruptions up to and including nuclear war, this is a myth; in fact,
   ARPANET was conceived from the start as a way to get most economical use
   out of then-scarce large-computer resources.

   As originally imagined, ARPANET's major use would have been to support
   what is now called remote login and more sophisticated forms of
   distributed computing, but the infant technology of electronic mail
   quickly grew to dominate actual usage. Universities, research labs and
   defense contractors early discovered the Internet's potential as a
   medium of communication between _humans_ and linked up in steadily
   increasing numbers, connecting together a quirky mix of academics,
   techies, hippies, SF fans, hackers, and anarchists. The roots of this
   lexicon lie in those early years.

   Over the next quarter-century the Internet evolved in many ways. The
   typical machine/OS combination moved from DEC PDP-10s and PDP-20s,
   running TOPS-10 and TOPS-20, to PDP-11s and VAXes and Suns running
   Unix, and in the 1990s to Unix on Intel microcomputers. The Internet's
   protocols grew more capable, most notably in the move from NCP/IP to
   TCP/IP in 1982 and the implementation of Domain Name Service in 1983.
   It was around this time that people began referring to the collection of
   interconnected networks with ARPANET at its core as "the Internet".

   The ARPANET had a fairly strict set of participation guidelines -
   connected institutions had to be involved with a DOD-related research
   project. By the mid-80s, many of the organizations clamoring to join
   didn't fit this profile. In 1986, the National Science Foundation built
   NSFnet to open up access to its five regional supercomputing centers;
   NSFnet became the backbone of the Internet, replacing the original
   ARPANET pipes (which were formally shut down in 1990). Between 1990 and
   late 1994 the pieces of NSFnet were sold to major telecommunications
   companies until the Internet backbone had gone completely commercial.

   That year, 1994, was also the year the mainstream culture discovered
   the Internet. Once again, the killer app was not the anticipated one -
   rather, what caught the public imagination was the hypertext and
   multimedia features of the World Wide Web. Subsequently the Internet has
   seen off its only serious challenger (the OSI protocol stack favored by
   European telecoms monopolies) and is in the process of absorbing into
   itself many of the proprietary networks built during the second wave of
   wide-area networking after 1980. By 1996 it had become a commonplace
   even in mainstream media to predict that a globally-extended Internet
   would become the key unifying communications technology of the next
   century. See also the network and Internet address.

	

	Internet
     
         (Note: capital "I").  The Internet is the largest
        internet (with a small "i") in the world.  It is a three
        level hierarchy composed of backbone networks, mid-level
        networks, and stub networks.  These include commercial
        (.com or .co), university (.ac or .edu) and other research
        networks (.org, .net) and military (.mil) networks and span
        many different physical networks around the world with various
        protocols, chiefly the Internet Protocol.
     
        Until the advent of the World-Wide Web in 1990, the Internet
        was almost entirely unknown outside universities and corporate
        research departments and was accessed mostly via command
        line interfaces such as telnet and FTP.  Since then it
        has grown to become an almost-ubiquitous aspect of modern
        information systems, becoming highly commercial and a widely
        accepted medium for all sort of customer relations such as
        advertising, brand building, and online sales and services.
        Its original spirit of cooperation and freedom have, to a
        great extent, survived this explosive transformation with the
        result that the vast majority of information available on the
        Internet is free of charge.
     
        While the web (primarily in the form of HTML and HTTP) is
        the best known aspect of the Internet, there are many other
        protocols in use, supporting applications such as
        electronic mail, Usenet, chat, remote login, and file
        transfer.
     
        There were 20,242 unique commercial domains registered with
        InterNIC in September 1994, 10% more than in August 1994.
        In 1996 there were over 100 Internet access providers in the
        US and a few in the UK (e.g. the BBC Networking Club,
        Demon, PIPEX).
     
        There are several bodies associated with the running of the
        Internet, including the Internet Architecture Board, the
        Internet Assigned Numbers Authority, the Internet
        Engineering and Planning Group, Internet Engineering
        Steering Group, and the Internet Society.
     
        See also NYsernet, EUNet.
     
        The Internet Index (http://www.openmarket.com/intindex) -
        statistics about the Internet.
     
        (2000-02-21)

	

	internet
     
         (Note: not capitalised) Any set of networks
        interconnected with routers.  The Internet is the biggest
        example of an internet.
     
        (1996-09-17)

	

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