A look back at the humble beginnings of some of the internets biggest websites. This post was originally posted by the Telegraph and we feel it fits as a sturn reminder to all those companies and individuals who wait and wait and wait in launching their website while messing over the little details. We say – ‘Just launch it!’, as as we can see from the following screenshots you have to start somewhere.
1. Google.com – launched in 1996
2. Facebook.com – launched in 2004
3. Myspace.com – launched in 2003
4. Yahoo.com – launched in 1994
5. Youtube.com – launched in 2005
6. Wikipedia.org – launched in 2001
7. MSN.com – launched in 1995
8. Apple.com – launched in 1987 (screenshot from 1996)
9. Drudgereport.com – launched in 1997
10. Amazon.com – launched in 1995
11. Twitter.com – launched in 2006
12. Whitehouse.gov – launched in 1994
13. Craigslist.org – launched in 1995
14. Nytimes.com – launched in 1995
15. News.bbc.co.uk – launched in 1997
16. Dell.com – launched in 1996
17. Friendsreunited.com – launched in 2000
18. Telegraph.co.uk – launched in 1994
19. Blogger.com – launched in 1999
20. Flickr.com – launched in 2004
Had a website in development for over a year?
Direct your client to this page, prove to them it doesn’t have to be perfect from day one! Web design is NEVER perfect!
September 25th, 2009 at 3:59 pm
God Gordon Brown looks so young there!
September 25th, 2009 at 4:05 pm
I liked Googles statement…
“index contains – 25 million pages (soon to be much bigger)”
Google didn’t lie did they :p
September 25th, 2009 at 4:11 pm
Gordon Brown may look younger but he also (rather appropriately) looks more like Mr Bean in the 1997 photo.
Nice blog post.
September 25th, 2009 at 7:57 pm
It’s always fun to look at the Internet Time Machine (now called the Internet Archive, or Wayback Machine) at
http://www.archive.org/
Interestingly, they don’t have an entry for Google.com until 98, which is the rather less than impressive “Welcome to Google” followed by a link to “Google Search Engine Prototype”
http://web.archive.org/web/19981111184551/http://google.com/
September 26th, 2009 at 2:41 am
Wow, how nostalgic a collection, Gary!
Thanks for the post. I really enjoyed this.
It’s very impressive to see that most of them look radically different now, but two sites stay more or less the same: Google and Craigslist.
September 28th, 2009 at 1:30 pm
Wow…myspace actually used to look very clean…little overwhelming nowadays
September 28th, 2009 at 3:40 pm
haha! That is an amazing post! I always like seeing where websites have come from.
October 6th, 2010 at 12:06 pm
That is an amazing post! i really like this post