WHAT IS INTERNET? TECHNOLOGICAL BASIS OF THE INTERNET – THE BASIS FOR ANTHROPOLOGICAL STUDIES

Abstract

The Internet is a global information and communication system which consists of networks that share information freely and it is used by approximately two billion people. Because of its complexity and outspread, the Internet must be observed through technological, social, commercial and operative aspects that reflect its faces. From ARPANET, via PC era and the era of Web 1.0 and Web 2.0 to the science fiction eras of Web 3.0 and Web 4.0, the Internet is becoming a part of our everyday lives and provides us with the global trend of networking. This mosaic of different media owes its evolution and popularity to the development of new information technologies, high availability and he utility of electronic mail and hypertext. Although not without problems (the legality of the Internet itself, copyrights and the intellectual properties, irreconcilability of language and standardization, etc) the Internet, with the help of social networks and various gadgets, slowly but steadily, pushes the television from the throne of mass popularity. The Internet by itself is not the main cause of anything and its effects cannot be separated, on the one hand, from the many social factors which affect the coordinates in which we move and, on the other hand from the combination of personal characteristics, needs and motives that characterize each individual.