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Early Social Media
The PLATO system, developed at the University of Illinois and later marketed by Control Data Corporation, pioneered early social media in the 1970s with applications like Notes (forums), TERM-talk (instant messaging), Talkomatic (chat rooms), News Report (crowd-sourced newspaper), and Access Lists (user access control). In 1979, Tom Truscott and Jim Ellis conceived Usenet, which was established in 1980, marking another milestone in online communication. -
FidoNet Forms
FidoNet forms as BBSs start to exchange email in North America and later internationally. -
Classmates.com
Classmates.com, originally launched as a list of school affiliations, is launched in December 1995. The site, founded by Randy Conrads, later incorporated features to help former and current classmates find and contact each other online. -
LunarStorm
The Swedish social networking website LunarStorm, originally called Stajlplejs, is launched in 1996. The site, founded by Rickard Eriksson, was renamed LunarStorm in 2000 and has been described as "the world's first social media on the Internet" by the founder. -
Hotline
Hotline, a chat, bulletin board, and file-sharing program, is released.The Hotline client, with its graphical user interface in contrast to text-based IRC, let users connect to Hotline servers run by individuals and by corporate users like Apple and General Motors. -
Bolt.com
Bolt.com was started as the first social networking and video website. -
SixDegrees.com
Social networking website SixDegrees.com is created. -
AOL
AOL Instant Messenger is released. -
AOL gets bought
ICQ is acquired by AOL, and the service is patented. -
Open Diary
Open Diary launches the first social blogging network, inventing the reader comment and friends-only content. -
Yahoo! and MSN enter the messenger game
Yahoo! Messenger instant messaging service launches -
SixDegrees.com gets bought
SixDegrees.com is purchased by YouthStream Media Networks for $125 million -
Friends Reunited Capitalizes on the Loss of Classmates.com
Friends Reunited exploiting a gap in the UK market following the success of US website Classmates.com -
First gamed-based Social Media
Habbo, a game-based social networking site, launches. -
Big 3 Drops
4chan, an english-language imageboard, launches, Myspace launches, and Skype, an instant messaging and video/voice calling service (VoIP), launches. -
Facebook: The Future
Facebook, the most popular social networking service to-date, launches -
Reddit enters the battle
Reddit, an American social news aggregation, web content rating, and discussion website, launches. -
Video Sharing Takes the next Step
YouTube, a video-sharing website, launches. -
Twitter enters the mix
Twitter launches. -
A New Wave
Instagram, a photo/video sharing and social media service, launches, Pinterest, a photo-sharing website, launches, and Quora, a question-and-answer platform, launches. -
The Future of Messengers and Streaming
Snapchat, a photo/video sharing and social media service, launches and Twitch, a live-streaming service, launches. This service is a spin-off from Justin.tv, as it is more focused on broadcasting users playing video games -
Love takes over
Tinder, a dating-oriented social networking service, launches -
Social Media cuts out the middleman
Patreon, a crowdfunding site that would later become a subscription service for content creators on social media sites, is launched. -
Gamers need to message too
Discord, a free instant messaging and video/voice calling service (VoIP) designed for the gaming community, launches -
The Next Big Thing
TikTok, a short video-sharing and social media service, launches. -
Tik Toks first Victim
Musical.ly shuts down and migrates its users to TikTok. -
Can't fake it when you make it
BeReal, a messaging application that encourages users to share a photo or video of their lives once a day during a two minute window, launches -
Can't join em, try to beat em
Truth Social, an alt-tech social media platform, is launched by former U.S. President Donald Trump after being banned from Twitter.com. -
Twitter becomes X
Twitter is acquired and taken private by businessman Elon Musk in a $44 billion deal -
Science meets Social Media
First post on X (formerly known as Twitter) through the Neuralink brain-computer interface