They grow up so fast, don’t they? To some of us, at least, it seems like only yesterday that this whole “internets” thing got started. I remember how excited I got when I first started seeing web addresses referenced in tv commercials back in the mid to late ’90s. Little did I know, really until today, how far back the commercial internet reached. For, as CNN reports :
It was 25 years ago — March 15, 1985 — that the first dot-com domain name — Symbolics.com — appeared on the Internet, ushering in the commercial age of the World Wide Web.
Having a domain name made it simpler for the average person to access a Web site. Instead of having to remember a long series of numbers and dots, you could type in ATT.com, IBM.com or CNN.com.
Of course, there weren’t a whole lot of people hooked up to the internet in 1985, and it wasn’t until 1991 that Tim Berners-Lee’s World Wide Web was introduced to the world. As the article goes on to say, it took over two years for the first 100 .com sites to get up and running. As late as 1995, there were only about 18,000. Today — more than 80 million.
I think that 200 years from now, when people look back on all the inventions, innovations, and technology that came out of the 20th Century, the internet will be right there near the top. Very few other innovations have had the kind of fundamental effect on everyday life that the internet has. So, as a guy with a very historically-oriented mind, I want to be sure to mark this date, and wish the commercial internet a happy 25th birthday.
Anyone have any memories of when you first became aware of the internet?