Rebuild the Internet
When beginning this project I asked myself, “What even is the Internet?” But I feel like the better question to ask is “What isn’t the Internet?” The Internet is used by over 4.57 billion people everyday and is the basic source of human’s news, communication, and interaction with others. This is why I chose to represent the Internet in a web diagram, spelling out each letter of I-N-T-E-R-N-E-T, detailing how and what it is used for.
The I represents interaction, everyone interacts online. Whether you’re interacting with a server or an actual human being in a chat room, in one form or another you are communicating with a source other than yourself.
The N represents networking, connections and relationships are made through the Web. People use the Internet to network to find new jobs, a spouse or partner, even reconnect with past friends and family members. Social media networking has taken the world by storm over the last decade, and we see networking becoming a vast majority of people’s online experience.
The T stands for technology. What is the Internet without technology? It literally would not exist. The current amount of smartphone users in the U.S. is 3.5 billion, which means that all of those people have access to the Internet right at their fingertips. Everyone uses their phones for a wide range of Internet resources from email to social media to just searching in Google when you don’t know something.
The E represents email. Email was one of the first forms of web communication before texting became big. People use their emails for a lot of different things such as communicating with family members, newsletters, work, and so much more.
The R represents routers, which is how we get our Internet access. Without wifi, nobody would have Internet access and the Internet would not be able to be utilized. Routers allow us receive and share information to and from the Internet.
The N represents news, which almost everyone gets from the Internet or television. Personally, I get my news online either through social media sites like Twitter or Instagram. I find this the most effective way to get news because the Internet is constantly being updated every second.
The E stands for everywhere. The Internet is literally everywhere — we carry it in our pockets and keep it by our side. The Internet is national, global, and universal. You can go almost anywhere and still have access to the Internet. Majority of shops and schools now provide free access to the Internet as well, utilizing even more data and connections between users.
The T stands for teacher, as the Internet can answer just about every single question we have. You can learn a new language, learn to cook, learn to sew, basically anything without having to pay for some fancy face-to-face class on the subject — it’s great!
The Internet is both great and scary…but I chose to represent the beauty of it and how it helps us with our day to day tasks as we learn more about the Internet each and every day.
