The focus of this paper is the World Wide Web, hereafter referred to as the Web. The focus is not the Internet, though the terms "Internet" and "Web" have been used interchangeably. It is my sincere goal in this study to preserve the research hypotheses, arguments, and conclusions that I gathered from my readings in regards to the Web. To preserve the cohesiveness and clarity of the paper, I took the liberty of changing most references to Internet to that of the Web. Where I felt the author was truly referring to the Internet as a whole, I retained the use of the term Internet. It was a timely process, but I feel strongly that careful thought be put into using the two terms in the research and education communities.

During an informal survey of secondary students, secondary and elementary teachers, and colleagues in the fields of science and education, I found that there is a free use of the term "Internet" when a person is actually referring to the Web. The same impression pervaded my readings and various interviews-it is accepted both in society and in scholarly research to use the term "Internet" to refer to the Web. This is widespread statement to make without sufficient support. That is why it is an impression. This is not to say that people cannot define the difference between the two terms. Majority of the people I spoke to could offer a definition without consulting any references, yet they still generally accepted "Internet" as a specific reference to the Web.

Looking back at the history of the Web, it is possible to see where this close association occurs. The World Wide Web was first released onto the Internet in 1991 (Cailliau, 1995). The Web made it possible to access instantly not only black and white text from the Internet, but color graphics and pictures, full motion video, and audio. In relation to other Internet services such as Fetch, Gopher, and Telnet, the Web quickly became the most widely used, surpassing Telnet as the most used Internet service (Crossman, 1997). In the course of this sudden rise of the Web, and its acceptance into businesses, schools, and homes, the terms "Internet" and "Web" may have become interchangeable.

Perhaps use of the term Internet only conjures up the Web by association, but using the two terms interchangeably is inaccurate. It is our goal as educators to teach precision and accuracy in literacy. Therefore, it is for that reason that I separated the two terms as distinct in this paper.