I heard a joke a while ago which I believe relates well to the internet "What happened when you gave a million monkey's a million typewriters? ... the Internet was born!"

Although this might be an exaggeration, the point it makes is that everyone and anyone can and does create web pages... I did for example!

There are millions of websites, billions of billions of web pages. Information overload springs to mind, but it's not.

You'll find an enormous variety of information on virutally every topic imaginable.

Most companies use the Internet for sales and marketing purposes, whether it's just advertising their products/services, or online sales. Individuals who just want to make a presence on the Internet usually make use of their free web space given to them by their ISPs.

People who are knowledgeable about the Internet, perhaps buy their own domain name like I have. What they do with it is up to them.

There is a lot of rubbish out there, after all anyone can create web pages. There is also a lot valuable information, you just have to know where and how to look for it.

Primarily this is done buy using what is known as 'Search Engines', these are web sites that have the capacity of cataloguing and referencing the content of sites on an apparently global scale. For more information on searching for information, look on the 'Search Engine' page, or click here.

Internet success...

Some of the bad points of the internet are widely known, yes there is a lot of adult material on the internet. It is true that sex sites are the most popular, successful and profitable website business on the Internet. It's difficult to make this a disadvantage of solely the Internet, as sex always sells and it is the oldest business in the world.

Probably the next largest business on the Internet is in the research arena. Almost every University and research establishment in the world uses the Internet to advertise their work. This probably helps them get funding to continue their work!

The DotCom bubble...

In recent years there has been much talk of the DotCom bubble that has supposedly burst, with all these Internet businesses going bankrupt. You're probably asking what is this bubble, and why has it burst?

Well, the internet bubble is a term used to describe the alternate reality that enables 5 people who offer a service on the internet, float the company on the stock market and over night create a company that is worth fifty million pounds, with no tangable assetts.

The bubble bursts when the banks realise that they have nothing other than internet knowledge and skills in an economy which is in ore of the wonderous internet world that has appeared. The public lose confidence, shares plummet, and the company goes bankrupt, perhaps owing millions instead. It's a strange world!

The biggest failures in Internet commerce, are businesses basing their entire income from website sales and/or advertising. If the world is prepared to purchase their goods on the Internet, then the business could do well with possible global sales, use the adult website as an example if you like. However most of the world is very cautious of such purchases (except adult sites apparently!), with breaches in webserver security being very much in the news of the last couple years. I'm sure this has been more than an influential factor in the DotCom crash.

I digress...

Basically the internet is a huge white hole, spewing information from all walks of life. Most of it you can trust, but be aware it's not all reliable information.

Visit the 'Is that true?' page for more information on the reliability of internet content, or just click here.

Copyright © 2000 - 2005 Onlinehelp, all rights reserved. Please read our disclaimer