It's a compilation of text, graphics, sound, video, and other files scattered on computers around the world on the Internet. The genius of the web is its architecture. Any computer on the web can access anything on the web. It works much like phone service. We are able to phone internationally because the world decided on a protocol for phone transmissions.
All phones speak the same language.
On the web, we don't use a phone. We use a browser, or web client, such as Netscape Navigator or Microsoft Internet Explorer and these browsers all speak the same language, HTML, the language of the web. The World Wide Web is made of up two different types of computers, those running Server software and those running Client software. They represent both sides of a connection on the web. The server then brings it back to the client.