Please help me document the history of social network sites by adding key dates to this timeline. The password for this wiki is snsay. Please, out of respect, do not trash this page, insert inaccurate information, or write stuff about sites other than social network sites. Also, i'm trying to focus primarily on major social network sites.
Nicole Ellison and danah boyd have written \"one history of social network sites\" as a component of their intro to their JCMC special issue on social network sites. A rough draft of this can be found here.
yasns-blogs is a separate timeline for social network sites that are primarily blogging services like LiveJournal, Xanga, and Vox. Likewise yasns-dating is for dating sites that are not primarily social network sites. And social-software is for related projects that are not primarily profile-driven social network sites (like Flickr, MeetUp, 43Things, and YouTube) or are software meant to support social network sites (like identity tools and aggregators). I did this for my own sanity; we can debate these categories elsewhere.
If you have any questions, contact danah: dmb@sims.berkeley.edu - i'd also be stoked if you'd email me if you make additions just so that i can track changes.
1988
- AOL launched with notions of public buddy profiles that were discoverable by interest.
1995
1996
1997
1998
1999
- 1 September: Cyworld launched as a forum
- ?: SixDegrees sold to YouthStream Media Networks for $125 million in August. Source: Dick Kelsey, YouthStream To Shutter Sixdegrees, Unload Sodalis, NewsBytes Dec 10, 2000.
- ? February: QQ launched as an IM site
- 1 September: Blackplanet launched as community online
2000
- 2 July: PlanetAll shut down by Amazon, incorporated into "Friends" feature
- 2 October: MiGente launched as a community site
- 30 Dec: SixDegrees closes down, YouthStream takes a 165M charge in Q2 2001 for the writeoff. Source: Dick Kelsey, YouthStream To Shutter Sixdegrees, Unload Sodalis, NewsBytes Dec 10, 2000.
2001
- ?: Ryze launched
- ?fall: ClubNexus introduced to Stanford
- 1 August: Cyworld incorporates SNS features
- 17 September: Cyworld adds Mini-Hompy pages
2002
- ?: Ryze founder Adrian Scott writes his Edge essay: "How do we scale up the number of quality human relationships one person can sustain by many orders of magnitude? In an increasingly connected world, how does one person interact with a hundred thousand, a million or even a billion people?"
- April: Jonathan Abrams creates his Friendster account
- August: Friendster launched private friends-only beta src
- December : In France, the radiostation Skyrock launched his platform of Skyblog. In july 2007, 10 000 000 of spaces have been created, 2 700 000 profiles created. This platform follows a device of profiles, launched in 1997.
2003
- ? May: LinkedIn launched
- ?: Hi5 launches
- ? July: Friendster kills Ali G and Burning Man mega-profiles
- ? July: MySpace launched
- ? August: OpenBC launched
- ? August: Tribe launched
- ? summer: Friendster kicks out the Fakesters
- 14 October: MySpace adds comments on individual pictures
- 11 December: mobile Cyworld photoblogs
- 19 December: MySpace adds instant messaging
2004
- ?: aSmallWorld launched. Invite only, as a secure network for the wealthy and well connected.
- ?: Piczo launched
- 10 January: Pacman appears on front page of MySpace when site crashes
- mid-January: Dogster launches as a Friendster spoof (src)
- 22 January: Google launches orkut
- ? February: Facebook launched
- 25 February: Mixi user #1 makes diary entry #1
- ? March: Multiply launched
- 5 April: Dodgeball launched
- 14 April: Cyworld launches mobile version
- 4 June: Friendster first appeared in mainstream press (Village Voice)
- ? June: Affinity Engines sues Google over orkut
- 30 August: Friendster fires programmer troutgirl for blogging; "cancel your Friendster" movement spreads across various blogs
- 21 September: R.E.M. launches their new album on MySpace (src)
2005
- ? January: Bebo launches as a contact-sharing and photo-sharing site
- 1 January: Brazilian hacker attacked orkut through XSS vulnerability
- 28 March: Yahoo360 launched
- 30 March: Unique URLs appear on MySpace
- 10 May: aSmallWorldannounces that key functionalities of their platform are now accessible via mobile phone
- 12 May: Google acquires Dodgeball (src)
- 8 June: Cyworld launches in China
- 19 July: Murdoch purchases MySpace
- 20 July: Bebo relaunches as a social network site
- 25 July: Yahoo360 adds RSS feeds to the vitality stream
- 15 August: imeem launches with desktop client (src)
- 2 September: Facebook launched to high school students
- ~ 6 October: University of New Mexico blocks Facebook (src)
- 31 October: AsianAvenue relaunches with social network features
- ? November/December: BlackPlanet relaunches with social network features
- November: StudiVZ launches as social network site for european students. Seemes to be a Facebook-Copy.
- 8 November: Tagworld launches (src)
- ? December: Zaadz launches
- ~ 8 December: MySpace gets credit for Arctic Monkeys (src, some buzz on this earlier in October)
- 11 December: Facebook expanded to foreign colleges
- 12 December: Tagworld launches music service (src)
- 20 December: MySpace blocks YouTube
- 20 December: Tribe prohibited sexually explicit content
2006
- 19 January: Tribe changed its layout and UI
- 19 January: MySpace launches video sharing (source)
- 27 February: Facebook started allowing college students to friend high school students
- 27 March: students protest immigration laws, organized through MySpace
- 26 Apr: Facebook opens doors to corporate networks (src)
- ? April/May: X-Men ad launches with Top Friends feature on MySpace
- ? May: Billy Bragg removes music from MySpace in protest
- 10 May: AOL launches AIM Pages (src)
- 11 May: DOPA legislation introduced over social network sites
- 15 May: MiGente relaunches new additional social network features
- ? June: MySpace changes TOS to clarify nonexclusive rights
- 14 June: Top 8/16/20/24 available for everyone on MySpace
- 15 June: Yahoo360 adds enables "adult wall" features
- 22 June: Private profiles available for everyone on MySpace
- 11 July: Bebo adds music profiles
- 27 July: DOPA passed the House 410-15
- 27 July: Cyworld opens up to US (src)
- 7 August: Google makes MySpace deal to provide ads for $900M
- 15 August: Facebook opens its API (src)
- 22 August: Brazilian judge orders Google to release orkut user's info
- 5 September: Facebook launches "news feeds," prompting outrage
- 14 September: Mixi IPO
- 18 September: yacht6 is launched. A 10startups experiment, marketed toward those who desire aSmallWorld experience, but don't have the social connections ASW requires as an invitation only site.
- 21 September: Tribe reverted UI
- 26 September: Facebook was made available to anyone with an email account
- 10 October: Indian judge serves Google notice for allowing a hate campaign on orkut
2007
- 7 July: Mazuk launches it's entry into the social networking arena.
Dates that I need to find
- When did Friendster cap the number of friends you could have?
- When did Friendster start killing profiles?
- When did Friendster run into server problems? have a read, maybe can lead somewhere :
- When did MySpace drop from 18 to 16?
- When did MySpace drop from 16 to 14?
- When did music profiles launch on MySpace?
- When did MySpace blogs launch?
- When did people start modifying MySpace profiles?
- When did Facebook open up to high schools?
- When did Facebook expand to community colleges?
- What VCs invested what when?
- What are the key turning points for the predator stuff?
Expansion data
115 connector sites, and their launch years
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