I'm sure this has been posted on many times, but I'm new and sorry for the redundancy (plus I tried to search the list and didn't come up with anything). What is the difference between sites and areas?

From what I know, an area is supposedly used for finished content and to mimic organization structure. Sites are for collaborating between individuals to produce finished products to put into a particular area.

Where I get confused is that an area also provides means for collaborating - such as discussion web parts, events, etc. So what is the real difference with a site? I believe there are some permission differences between sites and areas, but functionally they seem the same to me.

For example, if you have a sample organization that consists of a HR and IT (with sub group of Network and Software). I would envision an Area of HR and one of IT. Then IT would have two sub areas - Network and Software. At what point would I consider using a WSS site? Should I use WSS sites for specific projects of the HR or IT people, like a site for a New Widget Gadget that the Software group is developing. Then just link that site to the Software sub area?

Any help would be greatly appreciated. It seems like the high level stuff of SharePoint is pretty hard to get a grasp of. Anyone know of some good links for information on some of these basic questions? Thanks