The ever-evolving internet...

Have you ever had that feeling of just total helplessness? Well, that's how I feel every time my internet stops working or I am traveling without it, or even when I forget my cell phone. It's like I cannot be connected to the world without these things. I feel as if I am going to miss something big!

I think that the internet is everywhere! My parents just bought a fairly new device from Verizon that lets you access the internet through broadband anywhere that there is a cell phone tower. To me, it is incredible. All though I don't pay for internet capabilities on my cell phone, the mere fact that I could be connected anytime, anyplace if I wanted to, is also incredible!

Even though I am only 21 years old, I feel old when I think of what computers and the internet used to be like. I can still hear the sound of my computer dialing-up to AOL in my sleep! And I still remember how mad I used to get when I would be chatting with my friends and someone in the house would pick up the land line and... boom... I'd be kicked off! Some great fights started in my house because of that very reason!

Those were the times of Web 1.0... we no longer live in that era, but we will forever remember the "old" internet. The internet of the past, as I like to refer to it, was more of a place to send a quick email to a family member or friend. There wasn't much else to do but email, IM, and go into chatrooms.

The internet today is much different. Some people refer to it as Web 2.0... the next generation in internet! A blog by a man named Joe explained it pretty well to me. He says Web 1.0 is about writing, Web 2.0 is about reading, along with many other great comparisons.

As Tim O'Reilly explains in his article, What is Web 2.0, it seems to me as if Web 2.0 is easier to use, and more user-oriented. This can help the media use the internet because more people will spend more time searching the internet for interactive uses. The internet has become much more of an entertainment vice as well as for receiving information.