English Language & Usage Stack Exchange is a question and answer site for linguists, etymologists, and serious English language enthusiasts. It only takes a minute to sign up.
Sign up to join this community
As a proper noun, and as something commonly referred to in everyday life, I've heard both "the internet," and "internet" when using it as a noun. Ex:
I went on the Internet
Vs.
I found my answer via Internet
Although the second of the two sounds more awkward when saying it out loud, is it still acceptable?
I would never use it without "the".
Note that your counter example may well not be one. It appears to be parallel to phrases like "by train" and "on foot", which don't use an article that would otherwise be needed.
The word internet (also internetwork) is simply a contraction of the phrase interconnected network. However, when written with a capital "I", the Internet refers to the worldwide set of interconnected networks. Hence, the Internet is an internet, but the reverse does not apply.
I was also searching for information about this topic and thought it would be helpful to share. It helps to understand why "the" is needed. It's important to differentiate from any other interconnected network. Therefore, the Internet is a specific kind of internet, the worldwide set of interconnected networks, that's why the definite article is needed.
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalization_of_Internet
