My understanding/hope is that the author uses "internet" to mean the technology. Colloquially we use "internet" to also refer to every technology that runs on t

My understanding/hope is that the author uses "internet" to mean the technology. Colloquially we use "internet" to also refer to every technology that runs on top of the internet (like the web), but 'connect devices together' is a meaningful statement and the internet is the technology that we currently use to do that.