As a verb, it means to transfer data or files from a local device to a remote computer or the internet. As a noun, it refers to the data that has been transferred.
Formed in the 1980s from 'up' (toward a central system or higher-level computer) + 'load' (to put data or material in). It followed the earlier computing term 'download'.
We imagine big servers or the 'cloud' as being 'up' and our personal devices as 'down', even though they’re all just machines on desks somewhere. That mental picture is so strong it gave us upload and download as natural opposites.
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