When you hear someone refer to the Internet as the World Wide Web (WWW), what comes to mind?

Perhaps, you’re laughing at your Mom or Dad because you’re 23 years old and hearing them talk about what it was like when yahoo.com was, actually, a big deal, is kind of hilarious. Or, maybe, the term “webmaster” – once used to describe someone who created every bit of a website – is a term that’s all but disappeared.

All kidding aside, regardless of your age or generation, or how you might be using technology when you’re online, the World Wide Web is a permanent part of our society. What’s more, it’s intertwined in, seemingly, every aspect of our everyday life. Maybe that’s why later this week, on Friday, August 1^st, we will again celebrate World Wide Web Day.

Of course, before we begin the celebration, it’s important to keep in mind that whenever someone uses the words “internet” and “web” interchangeably, a computer scientist might be tempted take off their lab coat and throw it in the air like Bobby Knight once did with a chair.

You see, the internet, was first conceived in 1969, and it refers to the system of networked computers which makes things like web browsers, web pages, and other applications possible. It would be two decades later, in March, 1989, before Sir Tim Berners-Lee would submit his first proposal for what would become the World Wide Web.

With the help of Robert Cailliau, a Belgian informatics engineer and computer scientist, they developed the HyperText Transfer Protocol (HTTP) and set it up for release in early 1992. Interestingly, the World Wide Web was not initially intended for use by the public and was devised, instead, to be utilized by physicists to share data.

Yet, it would be just two years later, in April, 1993, the Web was put into the public domain, ensuring its place as an open standard. And by year’s end, there would be more than 500 known web servers and the WWW accounted for one percent of Internet traffic. By December, 1994, the number of servers had grown to 10,000. With 10 million users, the Web traffic was equivalent to shipping the collected works of Shakespeare every second.

How does that compare to today?

Given the fact that any server that uses software that communicates with hardware, whether supplied by cloud computing providers or small organizations, can be classified as an online server, it’s virtually impossible to pinpoint just how many web servers are in operation. By one estimate Data Center Trends once believed there were more than 100 million servers around the globe, with many of those being on the internet because they handle HTTP requests, DNS logs, and IP address authentications.

Regardless, it’s safe to say that there exists a mountainous amount of data that we’ve created. In fact, the amount of data generated worldwide soared from 2 zettabytes (ZB) in 2010 to a whopping 64.2 ZB in 2020 — which is more than the number of detectable stars in the cosmos.

In 2025, data creation is predicted to reach 181 ZB by 2025 (that’s 21 zeroes). And in case you’re wondering, a zettabyte is a unit of digital information equal to one trillion gigabytes.

Now that you might be feeling more than a little overwhelmed by all these numbers and bits of data, there are three things you can do to have some fun on World Wide Web Day including:

• Search the web - What other way to celebrate World Wide Web Day than by searching the web? Use this occasion to check out different sites and give in to the power of the web.
• Listen to a podcast - Look, there was no such thing as podcasts before the WWW and the internet entered our lives. So, just do what any millennial would do and instead of watching a typical documentary, tune into a podcast.
• Make your presence known on social media - Without the World Wide Web, there would be no social media. What better way than to thank the person who created the WW by posting photos, statuses, and blogs on social media platforms. It’s the one time, you might say, that it’s OK to stay online all day and no one will judge you!

If nothing else, it gives us all an opportunity to revisit a time when we were surfing the Web while, at the same time, celebrating the fact that we’re not having to dial up a connection on our 56k modem!