Although it has largely been supplanted by the World Wide Web, a few resources are still available only by gopher. If the Web had not been developed, it is very possible that some enhanced form of gopher with similar capabilities would have become equally popular. The similarity between gopher and the early text-based Web is striking. Most Web browsers include the ability to explore gopher, for those few situations where you might need to rely on it.
Gopher is completely menu-based.
When using gopher, you're either looking at a document or a menu - a list of documents. There is no mingling of the two. For an example of how this works, try the gopher server at the University of Minnesota. The documents you view through gopher are stored on computers configured as gopher servers. Most are operated by schools and corporations.