Location, Location, Location!
Geography of the Virtual Nation
"The Internet has revolutionized the computer and communications world like nothing before. The invention of the telegraph, telephone, radio, and computer set the stage for this unprecedented integration of capabilities. The Internet is at once a world-wide broadcasting capability, a mechanism for information dissemination and a medium for collaboration and interaction between individuals and their computers without regard for geographic location."
Internet Society, 1998
The largest obstacle to overcome with the idea of the Virtual Nation is the concept of location. Where is it? Because this community does not exist within our field of vision - it is not a place we can touch - we have difficulty believing that it is truly a community. The Virtual Nation exists on the world that sits atop the Internet - the World Wide Web. By understanding the technology that creates this community, and the history of that technology, you can better envision the virtual neighborhood.
The World Wide Web and Internet
"HyperText is a way to link and access information of various kinds as a web of nodes in which the user can browse at will. It provides a single user-interface to large classes of information (reports, notes, data-bases, computer documentation and on-line help). We propose a simple scheme incorporating servers already available at CERN... A program which provides access to the hypertext world we call a browser..."
Berners-Lee and Cailliau (1990)
The term World Wide Web (WWW) is often used interchangeably with the term Internet. In fact, the WWW is one of many computer applications that run on the infrastructure that is the Internet. (Sol)
A Brief History
Introduction | Interactions