system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: Why do we need to go through a company to access the internet and why can't we come up with a way of accessing it ourselves? Do they own the internet?
gpt
The internet is not owned by a single company. It's a network of computers (called servers) spread throughout the world. However, to be able to connect to all these other computers, you need some type of infrastructure that connects you to the 'net. That's what the ISP provides. They don't own the internet, but they make it easy to connect to it.