Winsock, what is it?

I have never used or ever even had anything that brought me near this part of programming. since we have an unanswered post just below this post im very curious about it and what its implementation are and why we would need it, I did a quick google search on it and it seams like it allows you to give similar capabilities that a router might give, but im guessing its on a lower level that the router is on. (sorry im forgetting some of the fundamental things in my old age)

This is the post i was refereeing too.. Link To Post

Note: im not trying to hijack this im just trying to create awareness.