Internet Users Worldwide, December 2017. (Public Domain. Courtesy of the Miniwatts Marketing Group) The 1980s witnessed a significant growth in Internet usage. Internet access came primarily from government, academic, and research organizations. Much to the surprise of the engineers, the early popularity of the Internet was driven by the use of electronic mail (see the next sidebar). Initially, Internet use meant having to type commands, even including IP addresses, in order to access a web server. That all changed in 1990 when Tim Berners-Lee introduced his World Wide Web project which provided an easy way to navigate the Internet through the use of hypertext . The World Wide Web gained even more steam in 1993 with the release of the Mosaic browser which allowed graphics and text to be combined as a way to present information and navigate the Internet. The Dot-Com Bubble In the 1980s and early 1990s, the Internet was being managed by the National Science Foundation (NSF). The NSF had restricted commercial ventures on the Internet, which meant that no one could buy or sell anything online. In 1991, the NSF transferred its role to three other organizations, thus getting the US government out of direct control over the Internet and essentially opening up commerce online. This new commercialization of the Internet led to what is now Information Systems for Business and Beyond (2019) pg. 95
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