Much of the Internet may remain terra incognita. The obvious way to determine the number of people accessing the Internet would be to count the number of customers each ISP has. That, however, is easier said than done. A recent article in The Wall Street Journal noted that ISP counts in Asia ranged from 17 million to 39 million. Some ISPs count inactive accounts, while governments, attempting to appear cyber savvy, tend to inflate their numbers.
Commercial counts are little better.
Of course, with thousands of people going online for the first time every day, chances are that any count is out of date as soon as it's compiled. By using the principles of geography, ecology and statistical analysis, modern cyber explorers are working to map out the Internet. Right now, these are a lot like the maps drawn up in the Middle Ages. They're not meant for navigating. ABC News Internet Ventures.