IF you've never been on the Internet before, you might not know what it is and how it really works.

The word "Internet" describes the network (网络) that started in 1983. The Internet (or Net) connects (连接)computers from around the world so people can share (分享) information. You can play games, send email, find information and shop.

The World Wide Web is the part of the Internet that lets you see information using words, pictures, colours and sounds. Most people call it the "Web". Information on the Web is listed on websites. To get to the website you want, you need to use the correct Uniform Resource Locator (URL，统一资源定位器), or address.

What do you need to do if you want to surf the Internet?

If you know the address, just carefully type it into the box on screen. If you don't know the address, go to a popular search engine (搜索引擎) like Google (www.google.com) or Sina (www.sina.com.cn). Once there, you just need to type in some information about what you want to find. For example, you might want to find out about the weather in your city. If you live in Beijing, you would type in "Beijing" and "weather". You then get a list of sites, and you simply choose the site that has the information you want.

Don't believe everything online

But watch out (当心)when you use information from the Internet. Anyone can create (创建) a website, so you cannot always be sure the information is correct. An official website produced by a big company or organisation (组织) may be more useful than a site created by someone who isn't an expert. It is often best to use more than one source (来源) to make sure the information is correct.