Princeton's WordNet(2.50 / 6 votes)Rate this definition:

1. internet, net, cyberspace(noun)

   a computer network consisting of a worldwide network of computer networks that use the TCP/IP network protocols to facilitate data transmission and exchange

GCIDE(3.67 / 9 votes)Rate this definition:

1. internet(n.)

   A large network of numerous computers connected through a number of major nodes of high-speed computers having high-speed communications channels between the major nodes, and numerous minor nodes allowing electronic communication among millions of computers around the world; -- usually referred to as the internet. It is the basis for the World-Wide Web.

Wiktionary(4.25 / 4 votes)Rate this definition:

1. internet(Noun)

   Any set of computer networks that communicate using the Internet Protocol. (An intranet.)

2. internet(Noun)

   The Internet, the largest global internet.

3. internet(Noun)

   An internet connection, internet connectivity, access to the internet.

   Do you have internet at your place? My internet is down and I want to check my email.

4. Internet(ProperNoun)

   The specific internet consisting of a global network of computers that communicate using Internet Protocol (IP) and that use Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) to identify the best paths to route those communications.

Origin: (1986) Coined by the U.S. Defense Department, shortening of internetwork.

The New Hacker's Dictionary(3.00 / 2 votes)Rate this definition:

1. Internet

   The mother of all networks. First incarnated beginning in 1969 as the ARPANET, a U.S. Department of Defense research testbed. Though it has been widely believed that the goal was to develop a network architecture for military command-and-control that could survive disruptions up to and including nuclear war, this is a myth; in fact, ARPANET was conceived from the start as a way to get most economical use out of then-scarce large-computer resources. Robert Herzfeld, who was director of ARPA at the time, has been at some pains to debunk the “survive-a-nuclear-war” myth, but it seems unkillable.As originally imagined, ARPANET's major use would have been to support what is now called remote login and more sophisticated forms of distributed computing, but the infant technology of electronic mail quickly grew to dominate actual usage. Universities, research labs and defense contractors early discovered the Internet's potential as a medium of communication between humans and linked up in steadily increasing numbers, connecting together a quirky mix of academics, techies, hippies, SF fans, hackers, and anarchists. The roots of this lexicon lie in those early years.Over the next quarter-century the Internet evolved in many ways. The typical machine/OS combination moved from DEC PDP-10s and PDP-20s, running TOPS-10 and TOPS-20, to PDP-11s and VAXen and Suns running Unix, and in the 1990s to Unix on Intel microcomputers. The Internet's protocols grew more capable, most notably in the move from NCP/IP to TCP/IP in 1982 and the implementation of Domain Name Service in 1983. It was around this time that people began referring to the collection of interconnected networks with ARPANET at its core as “the Internet”.The ARPANET had a fairly strict set of participation guidelines -- connected institutions had to be involved with a DOD-related research project. By the mid-80s, many of the organizations clamoring to join didn't fit this profile. In 1986, the National Science Foundation built NSFnet to open up access to its five regional supercomputing centers; NSFnet became the backbone of the Internet, replacing the original ARPANET pipes (which were formally shut down in 1990). Between 1990 and late 1994 the pieces of NSFnet were sold to major telecommunications companies until the Internet backbone had gone completely commercial.That year, 1994, was also the year the mainstream culture discovered the Internet. Once again, the killer app was not the anticipated one — rather, what caught the public imagination was the hypertext and multimedia features of the World Wide Web. Subsequently the Internet has seen off its only serious challenger (the OSI protocol stack favored by European telecoms monopolies) and is in the process of absorbing into itself many of the proprietary networks built during the second wave of wide-area networking after 1980. By 1996 it had become a commonplace even in mainstream media to predict that a globally-extended Internet would become the key unifying communications technology of the next century. See also the network.

U.S. National Library of Medicine(1.00 / 1 vote)Rate this definition:

1. Internet

   A loose confederation of computer communication networks around the world. The networks that make up the Internet are connected through several backbone networks. The Internet grew out of the US Government ARPAnet project and was designed to facilitate information exchange.

Anagrams for Internet »

1. renitent

Numerology

1. Chaldean Numerology

   The numerical value of Internet in Chaldean Numerology is: 4

2. Pythagorean Numerology

   The numerical value of Internet in Pythagorean Numerology is: 6

Sample Sentences & Example Usage

1. Director Tatia Pilieva:

   Never trust the Internet.

2. Paul Vixie:

   The internet is not for sissies.

3. Warren Buffett:

   They've had the benefit of the Internet.

4. Tom Delbanco:

   We thought this would be a yuppie internet.

5. Peter Steiner:

   On the Internet, nobody knows you're a dog.

Images & Illustrations of Internet