Timeline of social media
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This page is a timeline of social media. Major launches, milestones, and other major events are included.
| Decade | Description |
|---|---|
| 1970s and prior | The PLATO system[1] (developed at the University of Illinois and subsequently commercially marketed by Control Data Corporation) offers early forms of social media with Notes, PLATO's message-forum application; TERM-talk, its instant-messaging feature; Talkomatic,[2] perhaps the first online chat room; News Report, a crowd-sourced online newspaper, and blog; and Access Lists, enabling the owner of a notes file or other application to limit access to a certain set of users, for example, only friends.
Tom Truscott and Jim Ellis conceived the idea of Usenet in 1979 at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Duke University, and it was established in 1980.[3] |
| 1980s | As operating systems with a graphical user interface, such as Windows and Mac OS, begin to emerge and gain popularity, this creates an environment which allows for early social media platforms to thrive and exist.[citation needed] Bulletin board systems (BBS) and Internet Relay Chat (IRC) were popular during this time period, and IRC is still widely used today.[4] The WELL, established in 1985, is one of the oldest still-operating online communities. Its name is an acronym for "The Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link", coined by Stewart Brand, creator of the Whole Earth Catalog.[5] |
| 1990s | The first massive social networking websites meant for outside of a specific group of users, LunarStorm,[6] Classmates.com,[1] and SixDegrees.com,[7] are launched. Up to this point, most, if not all, social networks are meant for a specific audience (for ex. students at a university). ICQ is also launched,[8] and remains operational up until the 2020s.[9] |
| 2000s | Various notable social media platforms such as Myspace, Facebook, and Twitter are developed and released, and blogging begins to gain popularity, with platforms like Blogger, WordPress, and Tumblr enabling easy creation of blogs with little to no effort. Instant messaging platforms such as AOL Instant Messenger (AIM) and Windows Live Messenger also become increasingly popular.[10] |
| 2010s | Many social media platforms are now thriving, and new ones are appearing sporadically. This includes popular blogs, instant messaging services (for ex. Whatsapp), and various social networking sites such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Snapchat, Twitter, and Instagram.[11]
With advances in smartphone technology, almost all social media services now have their own mobile apps,[12] with some even having computer programs. |
| 2020s | The majority of users of social media services now prefer using mobile apps, with apps such as TikTok, Instagram, Threads, and X (f.k.a Twitter) garnering and maintaining hundreds of millions of active users daily. Most well-established platforms (and influencers) focus on optimizing content for engagement, algorithmic personalization, and maximizing revenue through targeted advertising. |
Timeline by year
| Year | Event type | Description |
|---|---|---|
| 1973 | Milestone, Launch | Talkomatic is created by Dave Woolley and Douglas Brown at the University of Illinois, as a multi-user chat room application.[13] It is an instant sensation among users in the PLATO System's online community.[citation needed] |
| Launch | TERM-Talk is created by the staff at the Computer-based Education Research Laboratory at the University of Illinois, as an instant-messaging application enabling any two users on the PLATO system to conduct a live, character-by-character typed conversation on the bottom of the screen of their PLTO terminals. Soon many features would be added to it including "Monitor Mode," enabling one user in the TERM-talk to share their own screen with the other user, to ask questions or point out something that they're seeing. Years later this concept would be introduced as "Screen Sharing" or Remote Desktop Software.[citation needed] | |
| Launch | PLATO Notes is created by 17-year-old student Dave Woolley at the Computer-based Education Research Laboratory at the University of Illinois, as a conferencing and bulletin board forum system for communicating with the user community. In 1976, Notes expanded to enable any user to create a "notesfile" on any subject. PLATO Notes would serve as the inspiration for Lotus Notes developed by former PLATO users Ray Ozzie, Len Kawell, and Tim Halvorsen.[citation needed] | |
| 1974 | Milestone | ARPANET evolved into the Internet following the publication of the first Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) specification, RFC 675 (Specification of Internet Transmission Control Program), written by Vint Cerf, Yogen Dalal and Carl Sunshine.[14] |
| c. 1980 | Milestone | Bulletin Board System (BBS) emerges as one of the earliest known forms of social media, and remains popular and under development until the late 1990s.[15] |
| 1984 | Launch | FidoNet forms as BBSs start to exchange email in North America and later internationally.[citation needed] |
| 1985 | Launch | The WELL is established, being one of the oldest still-operating online communities. Its name is an acronym for "The Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link", coined by Stewart Brand, creator of the Whole Earth Catalog.[5] |
| 1988 | Milestone, launch | IRC rises from the roots of BBS (and was initially intended to extend it), offering a similar service and experience.[16][17] It has remained in use to this day.[4][18] |
| 1995 | Launch | Classmates.com, originally launched as a list of school affiliations, is launched in December 1995. The site, founded by Randy Conrads, later incorporated features to help former and current classmates find and contact each other online.[19] |
| 1996 | Launch | The Swedish social networking website LunarStorm, originally called Stajlplejs, is launched in 1996. The site, founded by Rickard Eriksson, was renamed LunarStorm in 2000 and has been described as "the world's first social media on the Internet" by the founder.[6] |
| Launch | Hotline, a chat, bulletin board, and file-sharing program, is released.[20] The Hotline client, with its graphical user interface in contrast to text-based IRC, let users connect to Hotline servers run by individuals and by corporate users like Apple and General Motors. | |
| Milestone, Launch | ICQ is released by Israeli company Mirabilis.[8] | |
| Launch | Bolt.com was started as the first social networking and video website.[citation needed] | |
| 1997 | Launch | Social networking website SixDegrees.com is created.[7] |
| Milestone, Launch | AOL Instant Messenger is released.[8] | |
| 1998 | Launch | Open Diary launches the first social blogging network, inventing the reader comment and friends-only content.[21] |
| Acquisition | ICQ is acquired by AOL, and the service is patented.[22] | |
| 1999 | Acquisition | SixDegrees.com is purchased by YouthStream Media Networks for $125 million.[23] |
| Launch | Yahoo Messenger instant messaging service launches.[8] | |
| Launch | MSN Messenger (also known as Windows Live Messenger), a messaging, video and voice calling service, launches.[8] | |
| Launch | LiveJournal, an early blogging platform and social network, launches.[24] | |
| Launch | BlackPlanet, the first social network for the African American community, launches.[25] | |
| 2000 | Launch | Something Awful, an American comedy website, launches its forums.[26] |
| Launch | Habbo, a game-based social networking site, launches.[citation needed] | |
| Launch | Friends Reunited launches, exploiting a gap in the UK market following the success of US website Classmates.com[27] | |
| 2001 | Defunction | SixDegrees.com shuts down.[15] |
| Milestone, Launch | Windows Messenger is released, and is shipped with Windows XP. This is an integrated version of MSN Messenger. | |
| Launch | The Dutch journalism student Ramon Stoppelenburg launched Letmestayforaday.com as his personal social network, through which he collected invitations from all over the world to travel the world for free for over three years and write daily updates on his website in return. | |
| 2002 | Launch | Social networking and gaming site Friendster launches. The service would be popular in Asia and the Pacific Islands.[28] |
| Launch | Meetup, a social gathering organization platform, launches.[29] | |
| 2003 | Launch | Business-oriented social networking service LinkedIn launches.[30] |
| Launch | Social networking website Hi5 launches.[11] | |
| Launch | The business-oriented social networking website, XING, launches.[31] | |
| Launch | 4chan, an English-language imageboard, launches.[32] | |
| Launch | Myspace launches.[33] | |
| Launch | Skype, an instant messaging and video/voice calling service (VoIP), launches.[34] | |
| 2004 | Milestone, Launch | Facebook, the most popular social networking service to-date, launches.[35] |
| Launch | Flickr, an image and video hosting website, launches.[36] | |
| Launch | Orkut, a social networking website owned by Google, launches.[37] | |
| Launch | Tagged, a social discovery website, launches.[11] | |
| 2005 | Launch | Bebo, a social networking website, launches.[38] |
| Milestone, Launch | YouTube, a video-sharing website, launches.[39][40][41][42] | |
| Acquisition | Myspace is acquired by News Corporation for $580 million.[43] | |
| Launch | Qzone, a Chinese social networking website, launches.[44] | |
| Launch | Reddit, an American social news aggregation, web content rating, and discussion website, launches.[45] | |
| Launch | Renren, a Chinese social networking website, launches.[46] | |
| Acquisition | Yahoo acquires Flickr.[47] | |
| Launch | Facebook launches its photos feature with no restrictions on storage (but without the ability to tag friends).[48] | |
| 2006 | Launch | Twitter launches.[49] |
| Launch | VK (VKontakte), a Russian-based social networking service that resembles Facebook, launches.[50] | |
| Launch | Facebook launches News Feed. The original news feed is an algorithmically generated and constantly refreshing summary of updates about the activities of one's friends.[51] | |
| Launch | Nasza Klasa launches, later rebranded NK.pl, peaking in popularity by 2009, becoming the biggest social media in Poland and the 4th most-visited website in the country.[52] | |
| 2007 | Launch | Tumblr, a microblogging and social networking website, launches.[53] |
| Launch | FriendFeed, a real-time social media feed aggregator, launches.[citation needed] | |
| Launch | Justin.tv, a live-streaming that allowed anyone to broadcast video online, launches.[54] | |
| 2008 | Acquisition | AOL buys Bebo for $850 million.[43] |
| 2009 | Acquisition | FriendFeed is acquired by Facebook for $15 million in cash, and $32.5 million in stock.[55] |
| Launch | Weibo, a Chinese microblogging website, launches.[56] | |
| 2010 | Launch | Pinterest, a photo-sharing website, launches.[57] |
| Acquisition | AOL sells ICQ to Mail.Ru (formerly known as Digital Sky Technologies) for $185 million.[58] | |
| Acquisition | Bebo is sold by AOL to Criterion Capital Partners.[59] | |
| Launch | Instagram, a photo/video sharing and social media service, launches.[60] | |
| Launch | Path, a social networking-enabled photo sharing and messaging service for mobile devices, launches.[61] | |
| Launch | Quora, a question-and-answer platform, launches.[62] | |
| 2011 | Launch | Snapchat, a photo/video sharing and social media service, launches.[63] |
| Acquisition | Microsoft acquires Skype Technologies for $8.5 billion.[64] | |
| Launch | Google+, a social networking service, launches.[65] | |
| Launch | Keek, a video-sharing and social media service, launches.[66] | |
| Acquisition | Myspace is sold to Specific Media by News Corp. for $35 million.[67] | |
| Launch | LinkedIn files for an IPO and trades its first shares under the NYSE symbol "LNKD", at $45 per share.[68] | |
| Launch | Twitch, a live-streaming service, launches. This service is a spin-off from Justin.tv, as it is more focused on broadcasting users playing video games.[69] | |
| Launch | Twitter overhauls its website to feature the "Fly" design, which the service says is easier for new users to follow and promotes advertising. In addition to the Home tab, the Connect and Discover tabs are introduced along with a redesigned profile and timeline of Tweets.[70] | |
| 2012 | Milestone | Facebook goes public, negotiating a share price of $38 apiece, valuing the company at $104 billion, the largest valuation to date for a newly listed public company.[71] |
| Launch | Snapchat launches video sharing, allowing users to share 10-second videos.[72] | |
| Launch | Tinder, a dating-oriented social networking service, launches.[73] | |
| Acquisition | Facebook acquires Instagram for $1 billion in cash and stock.[74] | |
| 2013 | Launch, Acquisition | Vine, a video-sharing and social media service, launches shortly after being acquired by Twitter for $30 million.[75][76] |
| Launch | Twitter files for its IPO, and begins trading on the New York Stock Exchange. The share closed at $44.90, giving the company a valuation of around $31 billion.[77] | |
| Launch | Instagram launches video sharing.[78] | |
| Acquisition | Tumblr is purchased by Yahoo! Inc. for $1.1 billion.[79] | |
| Launch | Slack, an instant messaging service designed for internal use by organizations and professionals, launches.[80] | |
| Launch | Yik Yak, a social media app for local discussion, is launched.[81] | |
| Launch | 8chan, a decentralized English-language imageboard, is launched by Fredrick Brennan.[82] | |
| Launch | Patreon, a crowdfunding site that would later become a subscription service for content creators on social media sites, is launched.[83] | |
| Acquisition | Bebo is purchased from Criterion Capitol Partners for $1 million by Bebo's founders.[84] | |
| Launch | Instant messaging and video/voice calling service Google Hangouts launches.[85] | |
| Launch | Telegram, launches service for exchange messages, share media, files, live location, hold private and group voice or video calls, as well public livestreams.[citation needed] | |
| Launch[a] | Myspace re-launches, coming out with a re-designed website, and a mobile app.[86] | |
| 2014 | Defunction | Justin.tv shuts downs to focus work on Twitch.[87] |
| Launch | Musical.ly, a lip-syncing app, launches.[88] | |
| Launch | Snapchat launches collaborative timelines based on events.[89][90] | |
| Acquisition | Amazon acquires Twitch for $970 million.[91] | |
| Defunction | Orkut is shut down by Google.[92] | |
| 2015 | Defunction | Friendster shuts down due to "the evolving landscape in our challenging industry" and lack of engagement by the online community.[93] |
| Launch, Acquisition | Periscope, a live video sharing app, launches shortly after being acquired by Twitter.[94] | |
| Launch[a] | Bebo re-launches as a messaging app for iOS and Android.[95][96] | |
| Launch | Beme, a short video-sharing app, launches. The creators are Casey Neistat and Matt Hackett.[97] | |
| Launch | Discord, a free instant messaging and video/voice calling service (VoIP) designed for the gaming community, launches.[98] | |
| Launch | Meerkat, an application similar to Periscope, launches.[99] | |
| 2016 | Launch | Triller, a video editing app, is converted into a social networking service by allowing users to follow each other and share their videos publicly.[100] |
| Acquisition | Microsoft acquires LinkedIn for $26.2 billion on 8 December 2016.[101][102] | |
| Acquisition | Time Inc. buys Myspace and its parent company.[103] | |
| Defunction, Milestone | Yahoo! discontinues its services for Windows, Mac, Linux, and Solaris clients in early August 2016. It now only supports Yahoo! Messenger on Android, iOS, and web clients.[104] | |
| Defunction | Vine announced that Twitter would be discontinuing the Vine mobile app, later renamed to "Vine Camera".[105] | |
| Acquisition | CNN acquires Beme, with the terms of acquisition remaining undisclosed.[106] | |
| Launch | Mastodon, a free and open-source software for self-hosting interlinking social networking services, is launched. | |
| 2017 | Launch | Gab, an alt-tech microblogging site,[107] is launched publicly on May 8, 2017.[108] |
| Acquisition | ByteDance acquires Musical.ly for $1 billion.[109] | |
| Launch | Pillowfort, a microblogging and social networking service, is launched, and is billed as an alternative to Tumblr.[110] | |
| Defunction | Yik Yak is shut down following a rapid decline in users, accusations of rampant bullying, and the app's banning from some schools.[111] | |
| ~Acquisition | Snapchat files for its IPO, and begins trading on the New York Stock Exchange. The share closed at $24.48, giving the company a valuation of around $33 billion.[112] | |
| Launch | TikTok, a short video-sharing and social media service, launches.[113] | |
| Launch | Co–Star, an astrological social networking service, launches.[114] | |
| Milestone | Tumblr announces a complete ban on adult content after Apple Inc. removes Tumblr from its App Store. The move triggers a massive drop in online traffic for Tumblr and a change in the internet landscape.[115] | |
| Defunction | AIM is discontinued as a service.[116] | |
| Defunction | Beme shuts down on January 31, following its acquisition by CNN in 2016.[117][106] | |
| 2018 | Defunction | Yahoo! Messenger shuts down on July 17, 2018.[118] |
| Defunction | Musical.ly shuts down and migrates its users to TikTok.[88] | |
| Defunction | Path announces the termination of its service on September 17, 2018.[119] Its closure takes place nearly a month later, on October 18, 2018.[119] | |
| Launch | Parler launches, an alt-tech social media billing itself as an unbiased and free speech alternative to larger social media platforms, such as Twitter and Facebook.[citation needed] | |
| 2019 | Defunction | Google+ shuts down in April 2019 due to low user engagement and an API flaw.[120][121][122] |
| Acquisition | Verizon Media announces it will sell Tumblr to Automattic, owner of WordPress.com and backer of WordPress for less than $3 million.[123] | |
| 2020 | Launch | Clubhouse, an audio-chat social networking app, launches.[124] |
| Launch | BeReal, a messaging application that encourages users to share a photo or video of their lives once a day during a two-minute window, launches.[125] | |
| 2021 | Launch | Gettr, an alt-tech social media platform aimed at conservatives, is launched by Jason Miller, a former aide to U.S. President Donald Trump.[126] |
| Defunction | NK.pl was shut down on 27 July ending a near-15 year history of once the most popular social media in Poland. Arrival of Facebook to the Polish market being cited as one of the reasons for the departure of users and eventual closure.[52] | |
| Launch[a] | Yik Yak relaunches on the App Store.[127] | |
| 2022 | Launch | Truth Social, an alt-tech social media platform, is launched by former U.S. President Donald Trump.[128][129] |
| Acquisition | Twitter is acquired and taken private by businessman Elon Musk in a $44 billion deal.[130] | |
| 2023 | Launch | Nostr, decentralized network protocol for a distributed social networking system, launches.[131] |
| Launch | Bluesky, a decentralized microblogging platform, launches in closed beta.[132] | |
| Milestone | 2023 Reddit API controversy, in which Reddit announced they would begin charging for use of its API[citation needed] | |
| Launch | Threads, a platform that uses a user's Instagram account to create an account in a format similar to Twitter, is launched by Meta. More than 30 million accounts were made in the first 24 hours of the platform's existence.[citation needed] | |
| 2024 | Acquisition | Italian technology conglomerate Bending Spoons acquires Meetup.[29] |
| Launch | Bluesky opens its platform to public registration.[133] | |
| Acquisition | Digital World Acquisition Corp. acquires Truth Social.[134][135][136] | |
| Milestone | First post on Twitter (now officially known as X) through the Neuralink brain-computer interface.[137] | |
| Milestone | The Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act was signed into law.[138] | |
| Milestone | Australia becomes the first country to have an age ban for under 16 on social media.[139] | |
| Milestone | App Store Accountability Act is introduced to the United States Congress for consideration. | |
| 2025 | Milestone | TikTok voluntarily suspends its services in the United States only for 12 hours, leaving a large number of users migrating to RedNote. This was due to uncertainty over whether the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, which took effect on January 19, 2025, would be enforced by President Joe Biden. Biden did not enforce the ban and neither did his successor Donald Trump, who took office the day after the ban legally went into effect. TikTok was the first social media app to suspend its services in the United States and the first to be legally banned in the United States.[140][141][142] |
| Acquisition | xAI acquires X Corp for $33 billion.[143] | |
| Event | Telegram and xAI partnership is announced, with plans to integrate Grok into Telegram.[144] | |
| Milestone | Florida bans kids under 16 from signing up social media.[145][146] | |
| Defunction | Skype shuts down, following its decline in favor of Microsoft Teams, Slack, and Discord.[147] | |
| Milestone | US orders mandatory social media screening of Harvard's student visa applicants.[148] | |
| Milestone | Reddit sues AI company Anthropic, alleging inappropriate use of user-generated content without consent for model training.[149] | |
| Launch | Snap launches Lens Studio.[150] | |
| Event | X bans AI companies use of Twitter posts for training or fine-tuning.[151] | |
| Milestone | India orders X accounts belonging to Chinese state media blocked.[152] | |
| Milestone | Yandex, Meta Facebook and Instagram found spying on Android Chrome users since 2017.[153] | |
| Launch | Bitchat launches, enabling users to chat over local Bluetooth mesh networks.[154] | |
| Launch | Sora 2 app launches, allowing users to create, share, and view entirely AI-generated short videos, similar to TikTok.[155] Critics of OpenAI characterized this as the company leaning into AI slop.[156][157] | |
| Milestone | 2025 Nepalese Gen Z protests | |
| Acquisition | Bending Spoons acquires AOL from Yahoo for approximately $1.4 billion.[158] | |
| Launch | Group chats in ChatGPT launch.[159] | |