Story of the Internet

2 computers MIT Lincoln Lab communicate using packet switching technology

1965

Nodes by

UCLA’s Network Measurement Center

Stanford Research Institute

University of Utah

University of California-Santa Barbara

1969

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First Message "LO" attempted by Student  Charles Kline  to login to SRI Computer from the university

But...

it was not completed because the SRI system crashed.

BBN’s Ray Tomlinson introduces network email. 

1972

1973

B Global networking becomes a reality as the University College of London England and Royal Radar Establishment Norway connect to ARPANET. 

The Term Internet is Born

The first Internet Service Provider (ISP) is born with the introduction of a commercial version of ARPANET, known as Telenet.

1974

Vinton Cerf and Bob Kahn  (the duo said by many to be the Fathers of the Internet)  Publish "A Protocol for Packet Network Interconnection," which details the design of TCP

Queen Elizabeth II hits the “send button” on her first email.

1976

1979

USENET forms to host news and discussion groups.

The National Science Foundation (NSF) provided a grant to establish the Computer Science Network (CSNET) to provide networking services to university computer scientists.

1981

Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) and Internet Protocol (IP), as the protocol suite, commonly known as TCP/IP, emerge as the protocol for ARPANET. This results in the fledgling definition of the Internet as connected TCP/IP internets. TCP/IP remains the standard protocol for the Internet.

1982

The Domain Name System (DNS) establishes the familiar .edu, .gov, .com, .mil, .org, .net, and .int system for naming websites. This is easier to remember than the previous designation for websites, such as 123.456.789.10.

1983

William Gibson, author of "Neuromancer," is the first to use the term "cyberspace."

1984

1985

Symbolics.com, the website for Symbolics Computer Corp. in Massachusetts, becomes the first registered domain.

The National Science Foundation’s NSFNET goes online to connected supercomputer centers at 56,000 bits per second — the speed of a typical dial-up computer modem. 

1986

Over time the network speeds up and regional research and education networks, supported in part by NSF, are connected to the NSFNET backbone — effectively expanding the Internet throughout the United States. The NSFNET was essentially a network of networks that connected academic users along with the ARPANET.

1986

The number of hosts on the Internet exceeds 20,000. Cisco ships its first router.

1987

1989

World.std.com becomes the first commercial provider of dial-up access to the Internet.

Tim Berners-Lee, a scientist at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, develops HyperText Markup Language (HTML).

1990

CERN introduces the World Wide Web to the public.

1991

1992

The first audio and video are distributed over the Internet. The phrase "surfing the Internet" is popularized.

The number of websites reaches 600 and the White House and United Nations go online. Marc Andreesen develops the Mosaic Web browser at the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana.

1993

Netscape Communications is born.  Microsoft creates Web browser for Windows 95. Yahoo! is created by Jerry Yang and David Filo, two electrical engineering graduate students at Stanford University.  The site was originally called "Jerry and David's Guide to the World Wide Web." 

1994

Amazon.com, Craigslist and eBay go live.  The first online dating site, Match.com, launches.

1995

CNET buys tv.com for $15,000. A 3D animation dubbed "The Dancing Baby" becomes one of the first viral videos.

1996

Netflix is founded by Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph as a company that sends users DVDs by mail.  Netscape announces that its browser will be free.

1997

The Google search engine is born. The Internet Protocol version 6 introduced, to allow for future growth of Internet Addresses. 

1998

Peer-to-peer file sharing is s reality as Napster arrives on the Internet,  a displeasure to the music industry.

1999

2000

The dot-com bubble bursts. AOL merges with Time Warner

A federal judge shuts down Napster, ruling that it must find a way to stop users from sharing copyrighted material before it can go back online.

2001

2003

 Myspace, Skype and the Safari Web browser debut. The blog publishing platform WordPress is launched.

Facebook goes online and the era of social networking begins. Mozilla unveils the Mozilla Firefox browser.

2004

2005

YouTube.com launches. The social news site Reddit is also founded.

Twitter launches. The company's founder, Jack Dorsey, sends out the very first tweet: "just setting up my twttr."

2006

The Internet marks its 40th anniversary.

2009

2010

Facebook reaches 400 million active users. The social media sites Pinterest and Instagram are launched.

51% of U.S. adults report that they bank online, according to a survey conducted by the Pew Research Center.

2013

Instagram, the photo-sharing site, reaches 400 million users, outpacing Twitter, which would go on to reach 316 million users by the middle of the same year.

2015

Google unveils Google Assistant, Google joins Amazon's Alexa, Siri from Apple, and Cortana from Microsoft.

2016

EU GDPR Privacy Cookie Law Takes Effect in May 2018

2018

2019

53.6% of 7.75 Billion Population of The World in now a Internet User