The Information Highway Essay Research Paper The

The Information Highway Essay, Research Paper The Internet has taken on a form of its own, if you just look at the number increases from 1992 to a projected 2002 you will see for yourself . With the growth of the Internet and progress we hope to achieve, we seem to be heading straight into the future of technology. What can this “information highway,” do for us regular day to day people? Students, teachers, small businesses, family, and even friends can stay connected and achieve a higher source of information then we could have twenty years ago. Many ways to communicate via the Internet are available to anyone with a computer. The first way; and they way I know very well would be e-mail but what exactly is e-mail? Electronic mail a.k.a. email, is a program that lets you

send, receive and manage messages sent via the Internet . An e-mail address consists of two parts which are divided by the @ symbol. The first part is the person’s account name, the second part is the domain name, which is the location of the person’s account. Many different programs let you perform the task of e-mail such as Microsoft Outlook, Netscape Messenger, Juno, Hotmail, or Eudora. To figure out which e-mail program to use would be up to you and your preference. The only difference is that Juno is free and you do not have to have an Internet connection to use the e-mail program but that is all it does . The second way to communicate with other people could be a newsgroup or discussion group. These two allow people with common interests to talk to each other and

discuss things or just get answers they are looking for. There are literally thousands of newsgroups that have wide range of topics including sports, Microsoft jobs or vacation spots. The only problem with newsgroups is that you have to go through tons and tons of other people’s messages and you may never find the answer you are looking for. Since newsgroups are where people type in a question or answer, you can imagine how many there are on a certain topic. A third way you can instantly communicate with people all over the world would be chatting. Chatting is a virtual community where people meet and talk about anything they want in an instant. Chatting is different then a newsgroup because it is instant and newsgroups are posted and replied to at a different time. The most

popular chat program out there is mIRC, which they call Internet Relay Chat . This program is text based which in short means what you type immediately shows up on everyone’s screens. This is where nicknames come in handy; since you don’t actually know the person you are talking to you should know net safety. Net Safety is use common knowledge, do not give out your full name, address, or phone number. Chatting can be great fun and relaxing and another great source for information. I have been chatting for over five years and I have met about 100 of the people I have met via the Internet but always at a group party. Believe it or not, not all people are wacko like the way the media presents it.With the growing number of ways to access these programs above the most popular I

seem to think would be the dial-up on your own way. This means you subscribe to an Internet Service Provider a.k.a. ISP and they give you a number for your modem to call this is where they will give you an account name that will become your email. These companies usually don’t offer anything else; you must have your own way of viewing the net. In the other case, there is the supposedly most popular on-line service provider American On-Line which offer there own internal links to stocks, chatting and other activities for kids. The only advantage to these companies is if you are new to the Internet and because you don’t really know how to maneuver the Internet. These companies give practice to the new people coming on everyday. A great site to visit to get information or to