Why did the GUI make the difference? Because people didn't want to have to type in long sequences of perfect text and numbers. Being efficient, they'd rather just click on things. But what does clicking on the Internet get you?

Let's go back to the 1960s again. Two important inventions were developed in that era. The first was the mouse, developed by Douglas Englebart. The mouse enabled the mechanical action of clicking, and transmitted the action to computers in a form they understood. Mice did not become widely used until the late 1980s, however. The second invention was hypertext, conceptualized by Ted Nelson in the 1960s. Ted Nelson envisioned a system in which text on one page could be linked to text on another page. Mr. Nelson was a science fiction fan, and used the preface "hyper" to indicate a seamless jump from one space to another through a strange spacial dimension. He actually started the Xanadu Project, which attempted (and unfortunately failed, by the early 1990s) to develop a global hypertext system for publishing and commerce. But Mr. Nelson may ultimately see his dream realized, since the Web is becoming just that.

So the commercial networks, the spread of personal computers, the adoption of the mouse, hypertext, and a bunch of enthusiastic users, all came together to create the Web we visit today.

The atmosphere is a cross between some Wild-West frontier town, a literary salon, a building site with no foreman and no plans, the world's biggest library without an index, or with hundreds of partial indexes - in other words, it's big, chaotic, dynamic and creative. The newcomer quite reasonably wants to begin at the beginning and is nonplussed when told that there is no real beginning. "So where can I go?" - "Well, it depends on what you're looking for..." Despite the provisional, developmental nature of so much on the Net (the Men-at-Work icon is one of the most frequently found on the WWW), most experienced users agree that here is the beginning of something new, which is just taking shape, and which will no doubt metamorphosize into something else long before we have got used to it.

As it stands, the Internet is worthy of interest here and now because it has reached critical mass in two key respects:

• Incentive: there are enough resources and activities "out there" to make it worthwhile.
• Accessibility: The technical competence required to access and navigate the system is minimal, so users can concentrate on whatever topic or activity is of interest to them personally.

If you want to do a bit of web surfing now, here are some sites of interest:

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