1. A set is a collection of distinct objects, which can be anything - numbers, people, colors, etc. Sets do not have duplicate elements and order does not matter.
2. Common ways to specify sets include listing elements, using ellipses or set-builder notation. The membership of an element in a set is denoted by the element being an element of the set.
3. Basic set properties include subsets, where all elements of one set are also in another, and the empty set which contains no elements.