The idea of a computer network intended to allow general communication between users of various computers has developed through a large number of stages. The melting pot of developments brought together the network of networks^[1] that we know as the Internet. This included both technological developments, as well as the merging together of existing network infrastructure and Telecommunication systems.

The earliest versions of these ideas appeared in the late 1950s. Practical implementations of the concepts began during the late 1960s and 1970s. By the 1980s, technologies we would now recognise as the basis of the modern Internet began to spread over the globe. In the 1990s the introduction of the World Wide Web saw use become commonplace.