From ARPANET to the modern web — the key milestones that connected the world.
The first message sent over ARPANET from UCLA to Stanford Research Institute. The system crashed after transmitting "LO" — the intended message was "LOGIN".
Ray Tomlinson sends the first network email and introduces the @ symbol to separate user from machine name.
Vint Cerf and Bob Kahn publish the foundational paper describing TCP, the protocol that would become the backbone of the internet.
The official switchover from NCP to TCP/IP marks the birth of the modern internet. All hosts must convert by this date.
A memo titled "Information Management: A Proposal" is submitted at CERN, describing a system of hyperlinked documents.
Tim Berners-Lee publishes the first web page at info.cern.ch, explaining the World Wide Web project.
CERN releases the World Wide Web software into the public domain, ensuring anyone can build on it.
NCSA Mosaic becomes the first popular graphical web browser, making the internet accessible to non-technical users.
Jeff Bezos incorporates Amazon as an online bookstore in his garage in Bellevue, Washington.
Pierre Omidyar launches AuctionWeb (later eBay). The first item sold is a broken laser pointer for $14.83.
Larry Page and Sergey Brin incorporate Google in a garage in Menlo Park, California.
Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger launch Wikipedia, a free encyclopedia that anyone can edit.
Mark Zuckerberg launches TheFacebook from his Harvard dorm room.
Chad Hurley, Steve Chen, and Jawed Karim activate the domain youtube.com.
Jack Dorsey's microblogging platform opens to the public after months of internal use at Odeo.
Steve Jobs unveils the iPhone at Macworld, calling it "a revolutionary product that changes everything."
The shift to mobile browsing accelerates globally, fundamentally changing how the web is designed.
For the first time, more than 50% of all web traffic worldwide comes from mobile devices.
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