what is an internet?

[Mary]

I think that this is a good question, and deserves a serious answer. I teach a class for people who do not understand the Internet, and I explain it this way.

Think of the Internet as an inland located on earth, it is it's own country. This island is filled with books videos, games, newspapers, colleges, and general knowledge, and is available to anyone who can access it. Now imagine that there are numerous bridges coming from all over the world to this island. These bridges are called internet browsers. Some bridges are very big, such as Google or Yahoo, and lots of traffic can get to the island fast. Some bridges are small, and only allow a small amount of traffic so that bridge is slower to take. The traffic that uses the bridges are telephone/wireless connections. Traffic from all bridges can get anything that is on the island (internet), and you can read it, watch it, play it, put your own information on it and so forth.

You can use any bridge to ask the internet a question, and you will get answers. This will help you with school work. For instance, say you needed to know how many feet in a mile. You could go to google.com or yahoo.com and type in that question. You are using your telephone/wireless connection, which crosses the bridge, gets the answer from the island, and sends it back to you - there are 5280 feet in a mile.

I hope that this helps you.

Mary Carmichael