• So what exactly is the web?

• The web is a complex, international, cross platform, cross language, cross cultural mesh of servers, clients, users, databases, and quite a few artificial intelligences all talking, working, searching, viewing, accessing, downloading, and who knows what else.

• As such, no one owns or controls the web. In fact, it is impossible to own or control by its very nature and design. In fact, "it" is not even an "it". You can't hold the web or make it tangible. Instead, you can think of the web not as a thing, but as a process, an action, a medium of communication.

• This fact has profound implications on how you should think about designing web pages. For example, give up any hopes of maintaining intellectual property over what you distribute on the web and know that the only information that is private or secure is the information that is stored solely in your own neurons.

  "The Internet" is quite a different thing from "an Intranet". An Intranet is a mini web that is limited to the users, machines, and software programs of a specific organization, usually a company. Since organizations are typically small and have more control over policies and information systems, intranets are often more controllable.

• So how do all these computers, software packages, and people communicate with each other?

• The creators of the web devised standards of communication upon which the web is built. These standards sit at a layer above operating systems, computer languages, or internet transmission protocols and provide a basic medium for communication.

• The two most important standards (protocols) used on the web today are HTTP and HTML. Let's look at each of those protocols more in depth...

Nuts and Bolts Resources

• EFF´s Everybody's Guide to the Internet