A Succinct Definition of the Internet?

magnamous asks: "Ever since Senator Ted Stevens used the phrase 'series of tubes' to describe his understanding of the Internet, I've noticed several stories and comments referencing how silly that is. Although I agree that that description is rather silly, each time I've found myself trying to come up with a -succinct layman's definition- of what the Internet is, and I come up short. Wikipedia has a gargantuan page describing the Internet, and Google's definitions offer pretty good descriptions of what the Internet is in a functional sense (with some throwing in terms that the layman wouldn't understand, or take the time to understand), but not really a good description of what it -is- in the physical sense that I think Sen. Stevens was trying to get at. What are your suggestions for a succinct layman's definition of the Internet?" I know some would say that laypeople should take the time to learn the technical, more accurate meaning of what the Internet is. The problem is that they won't. We all know laypeople. I live with two of them. When you start talking about 'TCP/IP' or 'DNS', or if you get far enough to start describing those terms, their eyes glaze over. That's what makes them laypeople — they don't care about the subject enough to learn about it in-depth; if they did, they'd be computer enthusiasts. So please keep in mind that, in order for this discussion to be useful, 'succinct' and 'layman' are essential parts to any definition of the Internet given here. Also keep in mind that 'succinct' doesn't necessarily mean one sentence; a relatively short paragraph would be fine, too — the main goal is to come up with something that physically describes the Internet in a way which laypeople can actually understand."

Comments

Youtube answers

[mattbelcher]

Just send them this video: http://youtube.com/watch?v=1n4fDgmrF3o

The Internet is a model train set

[sserendipity]

This is how I describe it to people.

There are a bunch of computers - big and small, like the one on your desk and big ones that live in big rooms full of other computers. In between them is a lot of fiber optic cable. And organizing all the fiber optic cable is a set of junctions, like you would have in a model train set, only functioning at a bazillion miles an hour.

Each little bit of data that you ask for, and the request itself, is like a little train, going down a track. It keeps hitting these junctions that read where it is going and shunt it onto the right cable to get there. When it gets there, in all likelihood the computer at that end sends something back, which travels the same way.

Re:The Internet is a model train set

[fractoid]

Sounds good. I dunno about the trains and tracks thing though, since the trains get destroyed and recreated (cloned) at each junction).

I'd describe it as like a telephone network, where any computer can dial and talk to any other computer, but that's cheating because that's what it is. :P Maybe a better analogy would be a classroom with a bunch of kids (computers) passing notes (packets) to each other. If a kid passes a note to someone directly beside them (same subnet) then they can just reach over and drop it on their desk. If it needs to go to a kid on the opposite side of the room, they pass the note to their friend who passes it on.

Re:The Internet is a model train set

[Bin]

Maybe a better analogy would be a classroom with a bunch of kids (computers) passing notes (packets) to each other. If a kid passes a note to someone directly beside them (same subnet) then they can just reach over and drop it on their desk. If it needs to go to a kid on the opposite side of the room, they pass the note to their friend who passes it on.

That's quite good.

I would also say:

• You are sat at a desk just outside the door which you can open when you "dial-up" to pass notes to the nearest desk inside.
• The notes have:
  • Who they are to.
  • Who they are from.
  • Are only allowed 3 words of actual message.
  • A sequence number to allow you to send a long message by breaking it into 3 word chunks and the re-assembling the it at the other end.
• The other end will send you notes back saying "I have up to message 10", but they will write it "ack 10" and they can also send 3 words on that note if they want to.
• There is no teacher in the class room.

Bryn

Re:Pipes okay, but not tubes?

[coug_]

I'm no a fan of Stephens particularly, but he definitely got a bad rap for this one. The full quote is actually very well thought out and intelligent sounding, even if it is using layman's terms.

"They want to deliver vast amounts of information over the Internet. And again, the Internet is not something you just dump something on. It's not a big truck. It's a series of tubes. And if you don't understand those tubes can be filled and if they are filled, when you put your message in, it gets in line and it's going to be delayed by anyone that puts into that tube enormous amounts of material, enormous amounts of material."

I think Senator Stevens got a bad rap for that one. Techies often talk about "fat pipes" when they mean fast network connections, and evidently the image stuck in Stevens' head. I'd give him the benefit of assuming he was speaking metaphorically, since he must know that there's no actual tube connected to his computer.

Re:Best one short sentence description?

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, to anyone with a shared connection (office, campus, etc) this wouldn't sound right. In fact, I would argue that from a mere mortal's perspective the participating computers are not actually part of the Internet. I would submit that it's more accurate to say:

"It's the phone system for computers. It allows your computer to contact other computers and exchange information, just like you do with your home phone. And as with your phone, there's lots of physical ways to make that work (cells phones, old black rotary phones, big office phone exchanges with hundreds of handsets, and so on. To important thing is the information that flows, and that the actually connection part has been automated so you don't have to worry about how it works, you can focus on the communication part of what you're trying to do..."

            - peterd (not signed in)

Re:Pipes okay, but not tubes?

[akb]

I agree with the bad rap on the tube thing, but I would fail him in Networking 101 for "an Internet was sent by my staff at 10 o'clock in the morning on Friday, I got it yesterday. Why? Because it got tangled up with all these things going on the Internet commercially".

The Internet is like the road/highway system

[Hotawa Hawk-eye]

Individual computers are buildings -- homes, business, etc. The roads connecting those buildings are the wires and cables that carry data around the Internet. Each building (computer) knows how to directly communicate with some or all of its neighbors (you can walk next door) but data needs to travel on the roads to communicate with more distant buildings (computers).

There are lots of different types of vehicles (protocols) that are used to send data along the Internet -- regular cars (HTTP), buses (FTP), trucks (other protocols), etc. Often computers will send data piecemeal in multiple vehicles. These vehicles often need to get directions (routing) at various buildings (computers) to reach their destinations. When one road is blocked (network downtime) the vehicles with the data can find their way along other routes to reach their destinations, or the source of the data will write the stuck vehicle(s) as lost and resend them on new vehicles.

Re:the internet in a nutshell

[Anonymous Coward]

more like a really fast postal system ... everything being sent on multiple postcards and being rearranged into a sensible conversation at either end.

My definition

[Archangel Michael]

Internet is a collection of independent communication networks, connected to form a much bigger communication network through mutually shared collaborative connection agreements; a General Purpose Communication System.

People describing IP, TCP, Web, Usenet, VOIP all miss out on what the internet REALLY is, communication. The means, methods, routing and all of that is what makes it work, but not the purpose. Purpose is ONLY communication, nothing more, nothing less.

Re:Series of tubes

[Hennell]

> That some stupid politician doesn't know, or feels some need to create a definition, is utterly pathetic.
Its not just pathetic, its utterly embarrassing. If you're regulating something it would be nice if you have some idea of what that thing is. Saying stuff like:
"I just the other day got... an Internet was sent by my staff at 10 o'clock in the morning on Friday, I got it yesterday. Why? Because it got tangled up with all these things going on the Internet commercially."
does not exactly inspire confidence that he knows what he's regulating.

However I think he's far less unusual then you suggest. You might be right that most people have heard of the internet, but I'd guess loads don't really know what it actually is or how it would work. Try asking a couple of non-geeky people you know to explain how they think the internet works. My Mother who has been using e-mail and the web for quite some time, still doens't really understand the difference between the internet, Google and the browser. She didn't even realise there was a difference for many years. When I tried to introduce her to firefox she thought it was a different 'internet' because I didn't have google as the homepage (which is when I tried to explain google is a website, not the web. She didn't get it). Just because people have heard of or use the internet doesn't mean they actually know what it is, how it works, or anything other then how they access it.
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How exactly do rats desert a sinking ship?
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Re:Series of tubes is a good metaphor

[alienmole]

I think the uproar came about because many people (including myself to some degree) thought that the Senator really thought the internet was some type of series of tubes.

I agree that this was what many people seem to think, but it's an error on their part which says more about the listener's assumptions or comprehension than about Stevens. Taken in context, it's quite clear that Stevens was intentionally using a metaphor. If anything, the fact that his language didn't explicitly say so (e.g. by using the word "like"), implies that he felt that the metaphorical nature of his statements were obvious and didn't need to be belabored. On this point, the facts compel me to rule in favor of Stevens.

His comments don't seem to be so confusing when you actually listen to them

Quite so. Yet many people jumped on him for the comments mainly because they saw someone else do it, on a blog or on TV. The criticism ended being a social thing, with the factual basis lost, to the point where people who ought to know better technically are ridiculing "series of tubes" as though it somehow has no merit.

but when you start to look at what he is actually saying it gets a little worse

Keep in mind that this was an unscripted statement in a bill markup discussion. Googling just now, I found that Ed Felten agrees with me:

I'll grant that Stevens sounds pretty confused on the recording. But's let's give the guy a break. He was speaking off the cuff in a meeting, and he sounds a bit agitated. Have you ever listened to a recording of yourself speaking in an unscripted setting? For most people, it's pretty depressing. We misspeak, drop words, repeat phrases, and mangle sentences all the time. Normally, listeners' brains edit out the errors.

In this light, some of the ridicule of Stevens seems a bit unfair. He said the Internet is made up of "tubes". Taken literally, that's crazy. But experts talk about "pipes" all the time. Is the gap between "tubes" and "pipes" really so large? And when Stevens says that his staff sent him "an Internet" and it took several days to arrive, it sounds to me like he meant to say "an email" and just misspoke.

Felten goes on to try to interpret what Stevens was saying. I think he summarizes the whole thing well with this:

Why then the shock and ridicule from the Internet public? Partly because the recording was a perfect seed for a Net ridicule meme.

The problem is, picking on "series of tubes" specifically to ridicule ends up exposing a lack of knowledge or understanding in the person or group doing the ridiculing, and they start to appear irrational. This is a particular problem if they're using the ridicule to try to push a political agenda, like net neutrality. Who should we believe or trust - the guy who used a basically appropriate metaphor for the purpose, even if he was confused in other ways, or the people who are claiming counterfactually that the metaphor was wrong, for reasons that can only be guessed at? Incompetence is the most charitable explanation for the latter group, since otherwise the implication is that they're deliberately obfuscating the truth to undercut an opponent.

Re:Series of tubes

[Nefarious Wheel]

Yes, most people have an idea of what the Internet does for them, but a number of laymen want to know what makes it go without being shown what a routing table is or what an MX record is for.

For these people I say:

"It's computers talking to other computers over cables. The cables are connected via a sort of automatic phone dialer called a "Router" using a sort of electronic phone directory called "DNS" where the name of the site you click on to is translated into the that site's phone number. That's simplistic, and there's a lot more to it than that of course, but that's basically it -- cables, routers and electronic directories".

Disclaimer -- I'm a senior architect for a major telco's VoIP transformation, so nothing I'm likely to say is authoritative. But I do have to say these words to people...

A Network of Networks

[KillerBob]

Computer networks are ubiquitous enough that most people with any attachment to business know what a network is. Just describe the Internet as a network of networks. That's what it is, after all.

They don't have to understand how it actually works. But they understand the concept of networking through social networking. It's a concept that's innate to human nature. Computer networking really isn't any different, and isn't a hard topic for people to grasp in general terms.

Re:Series of tubes is a good metaphor

[alphamugwump]

And elderly grandmothers drive trucks loaded chock full of hookers and viagra. Without knowing it.