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The Internet
A historical tracing of notable moments that have shaped the Internet and multimodality as we know it today. -
The Rise
As a response to the Russian satallite 'Sputnik 1', the United States Defence Dept. launches the Advanced Research Project Agency (ARPA) who focus on developing computer networking. Image of Sputnik can be found on Universetoday.com -
Jargon Developed
Ted Nelson in many ways considered the father of the Hyperalization movement, coins the term 'Hypertext' which has evolved to stand for hyperlinks like these. Image of Ted Nelson's Computer Lib/Dream Machines -
The Foundations
In 1969, the first CompuServe arrived as the first major internet provider for the public in the United States using Dial-up service for a very select group of associated military members. This was a very limited system. Later in this same year, ARPA starts ARPAnet, what is to become THE Internet by connecting two major universities- U. of California, Santa Barbara and University of Utah. Image coutesy of Tibits.com -
The First Email
By 1971, the first email was sent from Ray Tomlinson TO Ray Tomlinson, a computer engineer working for a company hired by the Department of Defence. He sent a series of text from one machine to the other, and would eventually be remembered for choosing the @ sign as a part of the email address.
At this time, 15 sites were connected to ARPAnet. Image can be sourced HERE -
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Systems Are Needed
Domain's are now popular enough to have a system developed called the Domain Name System (DNS). Common domains are .gov, .edu, .com, .mil, and .net
Email is now frequently used by American's and European's with computer access. Check our the current DNS hierarchy here -
AOL Begins
Quantum Computer Services launches a service that offers email, 'bulletin boards', news, weather, etc. They later change their name to America Online, also known as AOL. Image can be found at The Birth of AOL -
The Emergence
Tim Berners-Lee of CERN invents World Wide Web, HTML code, and text browsers with a hypertext system and hypertext graphical user interface (GUI) -- huge achievements for the Internet's accessibility and technological advancement.
He almost named the WWW, 'Information Mine'.
His first webpage was http://nxoc01.cern.ch/hypertext/WWW/TheProject.html, which ironically, is now a broken link. Image can be found at achievement.org -
Free WWW
CERN donates World Wide Web technology to the world, and uses Mosaic, a new navagating system.
More than 200 servers are now online.
The World Wide Web still only accounts for 1% of Internet traffic. Image: Mosaic Navigation System -
The White House is on Board
The White House launches their website (that they still use today), www.whitehouse.gov Mass marketing is introduced, coining the unfortunate word 'spamming'. Image can be found in this really interesting article, How 20 Popular Websites Looked When They Launched -
Google
Popular sites like Google, Craigslist, MSN, Amazon and The New York Times have all been launched and are gaining popularity with the 45 million people using the Internet worldwide.
In the U.S., 43.2 millon people own a personal computer, with 14 millon of these people connected online. -
The Crash
70 million computers are connected to the Internet.
Viruses begin to spread and investments in the market slow, causing a massive .com crash. America Online (AOL) buys Time Warner to make the largest merger of all time. Image from research conducted by the Pew Research Center -
Apple's Boom
Apple releases their first iPod, Wikipedia launches, and Google answers more than 100 million searched per day. Napster, a music sharing site that was launched in 1999, is court ordered to stop sharing copyrighted music. Image courtesy of Forbes -
Where We Stand
There are 544.2 million users of the Internet worldwide, with over 50% of the U.S. online. AOL has 34 million members. The image describes the world wide dispersion of Internet use from Bruce McVarish -
Gaining Speed
Facebook and Flickr launch. Online spending reaches a record high-- $117 billion-- 26% higher than 2003. The web has now been availible to the public for ten years. Image from Social Media Observatory -
More Growth
Youtube and Twitter have launched, Google is answering more than 400 million searched a day. There are now more than 92 million websites online. This image is from New Scientist -
Media Expands
Apple introduces the iPhone- multimedia and Internet smartphone in 2007. Google Chrome browser is released, and in an effort to level the search dominance, Microsoft offers to buy Yahoo for $44 million. World of Warcraft hits 9 million subscribers as an advanced video game. Image from MacRumors.com -
Internet Dominates
Apple has released the iPad tablet computer. There are an estimated 2 billion Internet users- surpassing newspapers by far as the primary news platform. The FCC establishes net nuetrality Educational materials are now widely accessible for all ages online, Image from Blue Nation Review -
Exponential Gains
The online world has done nothing but continue to grow, with an huge population of global users. There are 634 million websites in operation.
Brazil is the most active country on Facebook with 85,962 posts monthly. 2.2 billion email users worldwide.
144 billon emails sent per day worldwide.
Gmail is the leading email provider worldwide with 425 million users. Image and statistics from Royal Pingdom -
Ever Expanding- New Forms
Internet use increases daily 60 percent of internet globally is accessed via cellular or mobile phones. On average, a form of media is consumed for 6 hours daily by the global user. Image from research published by Marketing Land
