Re: Re[2]: Proper Webs

[Steve Fouts <stefou -at- ESKIMO -dot- COM>]

iharrison -at- sct -dot- co -dot- uk wrote in article
<9608198431 -dot- AA843162663 -at- sctepsc2 -dot- sct -dot- co -dot- uk>...
|      I thought that the issue about whether it is the web or Web was a
simple
|      one - a web browser, The Web, but I'm not so sure now.

|      The nearest analogy to the I/internet and W/web I can think of is
|      telephones. We use telephones, but they are all connected together
in the
|      telephone system, not The Telephone System, even though there is
only one
|      global phone system.

I didn't catch the original message in this thread, but "the web" is not
globally unique as the Internet is. The Internet was not, originally, the
only net. There was Bitnet (the "Because It's Time" network), ARPAnet,
Usenet, lots of nets. One of each mind you, and one Internet. The Internet
eventually assimilated many of the other nets. There are still thousands
of networks but only one Internet.

Similarly, there are many webs but only one World Wide Web. That one is
on the Internet. I've got a web on my intranet. Couple HTTP servers, an
FTP server or two. Poof, instant web. I might work for a global company
has an intranet that is truly global. I can call that web a world-wide
web but I can't call it the World Wide Web.

Lastly, as to the question of why the Internet is capitalized and the
telephone system is not. Convention. By convention, the web that exists
on the Internet is called the World Wide Web. It is globally unique. It
is not synonymous with the Internet. By convention, the globally TCP/IP
network over which we are now conversing is called the Internet.

That is all I have to say about that.
stefou -at- eskimo -dot- com