Many people have their own interpretation of the internet but if we had to describe the internet, we would describe it as an explosion of a new youthful beast. However, for those that remember, 25 years ago the first internet domain was registered and it will almost bring a tear to the eye when you think the internet was only accessible using a 14.4k modem through an ISP that charged by the minute.
You may find this hard to believe but it wasn’t ‘www.internet.com’ or ‘www.dot.com’ that was purchased when the internet was born, instead, it was an off the all domain symbolics.com.
This particular domain name was purchased back in March 1985 by the Symbolics Computer Corporation located at Cambridge, MA. In 2009, a small group of investors purchased the domain name from the Symbolics Computer Corporation according to the domain’s website itself that has since been updated to hold information regarding the domain mentions and visitor locations as well as the registered .com counter.
Interested to see how it looked back in the day? Check out the first available screenshot of the site as held by Web Archive.
The last quarter century has seen the internet grow in leaps and bounds beyond all imagination and literally millions of domains are now registered with thousands more being added all the time.
For nostalgia, here is a list of the top 25 early domain name registrations:
- 15-Mar-1985 SYMBOLICS.COM
- 24-Apr-1985 BBN.COM
- 24-May-1985 THINK.COM
- 11-Jul-1985 MCC.COM
- 30-Sep-1985 DEC.COM
- 07-Nov-1985 NORTHROP.COM
- 09-Jan-1986 XEROX.COM
- 17-Jan-1986 SRI.COM
- 03-Mar-1986 HP.COM
- 05-Mar-1986 BELLCORE.COM
- 19-Mar-1986 IBM.COM
- 19-Mar-1986 SUN.COM
- 25-Mar-1986 INTEL.COM
- 25-Mar-1986 TI.COM
- 25-Apr-1986 ATT.COM
- 08-May-1986 GMR.COM
- 08-May-1986 TEK.COM
- 10-Jul-1986 FMC.COM
- 10-Jul-1986 UB.COM
- 05-Aug-1986 BELL-ATL.COM
- 05-Aug-1986 GE.COM
- 05-Aug-1986 GREBYN.COM
- 05-Aug-1986 ISC.COM
- 05-Aug-1986 NSC.COM
- 05-Aug-1986 STARGATE.COM
What is your earliest memory of the first domain name you came across, please share with us below.
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