As an old-timer: that was the exception, not the rule. It was just as much "the Internet" in 1993 as it is now. It just wasn't as widely known by the mass public, so different usages were less likely to be caught by editors/etc.

The usage appeared even in books on the topic. In my personal library I have a 1993 book, "The Electronic Traveller: Exploring Alternative Online Systems".

You can see the lack of articles being used here: http://imgur.com/a4qbEuJ

Both styles were widespread. Briefly...

Here's another instance of this verbaige on CNN in 1993: https://youtu.be/4aIkMwUeL_Q ... And another: https://youtu.be/gQwTOizZcAs. This talk show even commented on this exact difference listening to their own archives: https://youtu.be/QmKCmuIT1C0I And another https://youtu.be/UlJku_CSyNg

I provided 6 separate instances spanning 2 countries...

This is not false information. There's 5 videos and a photo from a book.

I have two more books with this usage if people want and I can dig up articles from newspapers too if needed.

In fact, there was a drive in late 93, early 94 to actively discourage this variation from being used. I can also dig that up.

I don't recall internet without the "the" being used by anybody in the UK in the early 90s. One confounding factor is that news articles were almost 100% written by people who had no knowledge or experience of the topic, and were almost universally as buttock-clenchingly awful as any article written on youth culture at any point in history. In the US in particular the press seems to glory in using the wrong phrases and sounding utterly disconnected from whatever they are reporting on