The 11 Most Surprising Facts in Internet History

Although the Internet has existed for a good handful of years and we believe that we have seen practically everything, there are certain facts that we do not know and that may surprise us.

In all areas of life, certain situations occur that we can consider to be really curious and that we do not expect, either because they are exceptional or because they happened in the past, which means that today they can be totally unthinkable.

The same happens with what has happened on the internet, some situations today would be improbable and others are strange, although not all of them have to belong to the most distant past of the network, since there are events that have occurred recently.

Let’s see what are all these surprising circumstances that we are talking about.

Index of contents:

Why email addresses contain @

Since we do nothing but send emails from our accounts, we are extremely familiar with the @, a symbol that everyone knows.

But the story of why it was used is completely the opposite, since the @ was chosen, since it was one of the least used keyboard symbols.

In 1971, when Ray Tomlinson was inventing what we now call email, he needed a symbol that could be used to separate username and host without causing confusion.

Of all the symbols the least used and the one that could not be confused with any other was the @ and that is why it was the one that was selected.

The first spam email

Spam emails are something that today seems totally normal to us, since many of us receive them practically at all hours, every day of the week,

But, although it may seem to you that spam is relatively young, the truth is that the first email of this type dates back to 1978when Gary Thuerk sent unsolicited emails to ARPANET users to sell them computers.

First royal to send an email

On her visit to the Royal Signals and Radar Establishment in 1976, the rQueen Elizabeth II sent an email using ARPANET.

This meant that he was the first person belonging to royalty to do so.

Free domain names

Today the registration of a domain costs money, the amount varying depending on several factors, but in the end you have to pay something, usually annually.

But, although it may seem improbable today, in the past, the domain name registration was completely free.

It was from 1995 when a tariff was imposed, it could even reach 100 dollars, for domain name registration for two years. Fortunately, that figure has been reduced substantially in current times.

WorldWideWeb, the first browser

Berners-Lee, the founder of World Wide Wide, also developed what was the first browser, whose name was World Wide Webwhich later it was called Nexus.

Although it was the first, the truth is that it didn’t just settle down and reach the whole world, which is why many people believe that the first browsers were Mosaic Y Netscape.

The first thing that is sold on the Internet

The market size of the eCommerce industry today is $5 trillion, but once upon a time there had to be a first item and transaction that closed the door on all others. now it is $5 trillion.

According to Jaime Bartlett in his book, The Dark Net: Inside the Digital Underworld, the first thing to be sold online, although the transaction was done in hand, it was marijuana.

If we want to know what was the first sale that was made entirely online, we must go back in time to 1994, when Dan Kohn sold a music album CD and payment was made online.

Why the color of Facebook?

For many, the blue color of Facebook is not the right one, for others it is perfect and for many people it is not a relevant issue.

But it can be interesting to know why blue is the color of this social network. The truth is mark zuckerberg selected it, since it is the most visible color for him. Simple as that.

Meaning of CAPTCHA

We may agree that it’s necessary for Internet security, but you’ll also be with us when we say that it’s the most annoying thing on the web.

Virtually anyone who has minimally navigated the grid knows what a CAPTCHA is, but not many know its meaning.

CAPTCHA is actually an acronym and stands for “Fully automated public Turing test to differentiate computers from humans“. It is not necessary to explain more.

Where does the name Google come from?

Let’s explain what comes from googol, a number composed of 100 zeros. when they founded Googlebefore using the final name, they selected this number because it represented their objective of organizing the infinite information available on the web.

However, when registering your domain name, Sean Anderson misspelled it as Googleand that’s how the search engine got its name.

The goats of Google and Yahoo

Both technology companies are among the most committed to the environment and have been working for years to reduce their carbon emissions.

But they went a step further, since Google made a contract with California Grazing to provide 200 goats to mow down their Mountain View headquarters. Yahoo did the exact same thing in 2007.

WiFi is not an acronym

There is a very large percentage of users who believe that WiFi means Wireless Fidelity, but it is not true. The previous name of this technology was IEEE 802.11b, so it was simplified to Wifibut really means nothing. It was chosen because it rhymed with hi-fi and was much easier to remember.

Even after the slogan “The Standard for Wireless Fidelity” was used by the WiFi Alliance, leading many to believe that was its meaning, the truth is that it hasn’t.

Surely some of these most surprising facts in the history of the Internet have been curious to you, in addition to being unaware of it, since, despite using it every day, there are still many things that we still need to know about the network.