The Internet may be the most enigmatic "wonder" of all. It reaches across time and space, and connects people from faraway places. It is vast and sprawling, and yet it gives each person his own private window to the world.

In just a few short years — and it really is still in its infancy — the Internet has revolutionized everything from commerce to education to dating.

The World Wide Web Is Just Part of the Internet

It may seem tangled, but the Internet and the World Wide Web (or simply the Web) are related but distinct.

The Internet is a global, public network of computers obeying the same rules — thus the information superhighway analogy. It is physically made up of cables and satellites, and has many uses, including e-mail, online chats and — the most popular — the Web.

The World Wide Web is a collection of browsers, links and Web sites — metaphoric destinations on the Internet superhighway. Simply put, the Web is accessed via the Internet.

More than 1 billion people use the Internet, according to Internet World Stats. That is one large neighborhood, getting more organized, and interesting all the time.

Internet Timeline

1971: First e-mail sent
1976: Queen Elizabeth is the first state leader to send an e-mail
1983: First colleges assign e-mail accounts to their students
1985: First customer logs on to AOL
1991: World Wide Web created
1994: Netscape browser released
1995: Yahoo hosts its first search; Microsoft releases Internet Explorer; eBay holds first auction; and, Amazon sells first book
1998: Google opens in a garage in California; the first blog community, Open Diary, launches
1999: MySpace launches; Napster created
2005: YouTube launches