The World Wide Web is the set of internet pages with links to other pages that underlies Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, other major social media, commercial and personal websites, streaming entertainment, and searchable databases. It’s a gigantic library, communication system, marketplace, workspace, and entertainment center. The Web was invented in 1989 by Tim Berners-Lee, who replaced the old system of cumbersome written commands and laboriously typed-out internet addresses with a system of clickable HTML links that almost instantly connect users, via computer applications called browsers, to distant computers, called servers that contain information in the form of Web pages and databases. Berners-Lee’s innovations made possible the convenient use of the internet by anyone with an online device. Thus, it is during the 1990s that internet usage took off.

The World Wide Web continues to advance, and online sites constantly become more sophisticated, with more features. Video streaming and calls, gaming, financial transactions, encrypted communications, chats, and posts keep getting easier. It’s hard to predict how people will use the Web, or its successors, in the years and decades to come, but there’s a high probability that such usage will affect both social trends and shifts in language.