Every business and many individuals need their own domain name. This unique alpha-numeric address becomes the name used to identify you in a web site URL or an email address. The great things about a domain name are that 1) you own it and 2) it is portable anywhere on the Internet. You keep the same identity, regardless of which Internet Service Provider (ISP) or hosting company you use. There is however, a lot of confusion about how to register and then use a domain name, as well as their actual function in the structure of the Internet.
Every computer on the Internet (even yours) has an address and, being machines, these addresses are numeric. They are referred to as IP Addresses (for Internet Protocol) and they are written in dotted-decimal notation; four numbers, each ranging from 0 to 255, separated by dots (e.g. 147.132.42.18). Even in the early days, when the Internet was used mainly by computer scientists and academics, they realized that referring to everything on the Internet using dotted-decimal notation was not going to fly. So a system was devised to use a domain name interchangeably with its IP Address. In other words, a domain name is an alias to an IP Address.
Popularity: 24% [?]
Senator Ted Stevens, (R-Alaska), U.S. Senate Commerce Committee hearing, June 28, 2006:
They want to deliver vast amounts of information over the Internet. And again, the Internet is not something that 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.
Well…that’s one way of putting it, just not a very good way. Let’s see if we can’t come up with a definition that’s a bit more clear. The Internet is commonly referred to as a “network of networks”, which includes millions (yes, millions) of interconnected computer networks that are operated by commercial, academic, military and government institutions. Because these networks all use the same communication protocols (rules), they can share common online services, such as email, chat, file transfer and the World Wide Web, the service you are making use of at this very moment.
Popularity: 11% [?]