What is the defference between the net the web and cyberspace?

Answer 1

The internet is the global communication network, both hardware and software infrastructure that links smaller computer networks throughout the world. Most people use the term as a loose synonym for WWW (World Wide Web), a system of interlinked hypertext documents ("website pages") accessed through the Internet. Cyberspace, on the other hand, is a vaguely defined term - invented by William Gibson - that refers the non-geographical, virtual, even metaphoric space in which all computer objects "exist". The term can include the entire content on the Internet, as well as the objects created by Virtual Reality simulations and computer games. What you should know is that the exact definition of the term is non-existent. Some people use it as a metaphor for the Internet; some people use it as an all-encompassing term for general networking and anything associated with computers; there are some people then who use the term in a philosophical sense, as an alternative reality of some sort. Practically speaking, it probably makes more sense to leave "cyberspace" to Science Fiction writers and use less pompous "Internet" and "World Wide Web" for descriptions of one's everyday online experiences.

"Cyberspace. A consensual hallucination experienced daily by billions of legitimate operators, in every nation, by children being taught mathematical concepts... A graphic representation of data abstracted from banks of every computer in the human system. Unthinkable complexity. Lines of light ranged in the nonspace of the mind, clusters and constellations of data." -William Gibson, Neuromancer.

"All I knew about the word 'cyberspace' when I coined it, was that it seemed like an effective buzzword. It seemed evocative and essentially meaningless. It was suggestive of something, but had no real semantic meaning, even for me, as I saw it emerge on the page." -William Gibson, No Maps for These Territories.

Answer 2

"The Net" is an abbreviation for the word Internet. The Internet is the connections between things like this page, a Usenet server, or a personal computer. "The web" is short for the World Wide Web, which is made up of pages like this one all linked together with links. Cyberspace refers to the Internet, as well as home and office networks and Intranets.