The Birth of the Internet

But hyperlinked text without any graphics did not attract scores of people to the Internet. It wasn't until the early 1990s when Web browsers were invented that the Internet and World Wide Web exploded in popularity. A Web browser is an application program that allows users to interact with the Internet. Now, instead of dull pages of hyperlinked text, users could enjoy graphics and multimedia applications. The first Web browser, Mosaic, was developed in 1992 by Marc Andreessen and Eric Bina at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA). By 1993, Mosaic was available to the public in versions for Apple Macintosh and Microsoft Windows. Andreessen eventually founded his own company, Netscape Communications Corporation. He, along with his staff, invented the Web browser known to us today as Netscape Navigator.