I know that for almost everyone else (women, kids, old people, non-nerds) the web is a billion things. But for me (and I suspect for many of my fellow male, older nerds), the internet is defined as a source of knowledge, far beyond being a music/movies/sex/friends/whatever provider.
And it's all because of a similar experience to you the first time I sat down at a computer in college and tried the World Wide Web for the first time.