Your internet provider (ISP)
🏠The everyday picture
The colony has its own lanes, but the road that joins it to the national highway is built and maintained by the government. Your ISP owns that road between your home and the rest of the internet.
📘What it really is
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An ISP (Internet Service Provider), like Jio, Airtel or BSNL, connects your router to the wider internet through fibre, cable, DSL or mobile towers.
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ISPs connect to each other and to big backbone networks, often through undersea cables between countries.
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Your plan's download speed (receiving) is usually higher than its upload speed (sending). Uploading large files or running a server from home is limited by upload speed.
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The ISP gives your router a public IP address (Module 5). Every website you visit sees that address.
- This is one reason websites aren't usually hosted at home: home connections have limited upload speed, changing addresses and no guarantees. Data centres (Module 7) solve all three.
🖱️Try it
Check your internet plan's advertised download and upload speeds, then compare them with your speed test from Lesson 2.
✅Quick check
Uploading a 2 GB video takes far longer than downloading it. Why?
Show the answer
Most home plans give much less upload speed than download speed.
Why not host a busy website on your home computer?
Show the answer
Limited upload speed, an address that may change, power or internet cuts, and security risks. Data centres are built for this.