Happy Birthday to a 10-year-old

IN Digital Media | 07/03/2005

The past decade has perhaps been one of the most exciting in the world wide web and Yahoo! is a name that`s almost synonymous with Net users globally.

Sanjay Sharma

It has over 160 million registered users across the world. It`s the site that attracts the most web traffic worldwide with 300 million visitors every month. To browse, mail, chat, check out the weather forecast, join a newsgroup, shop or blog. That`s nearly 89 per cent of all Net users. Hardly 2 per cent, though, knows that Yahoo! turned 10 on 2 March 2005. Which, in some ways is like a left-handed compliment given that there`s so much content on the site to do, play with and browse through. Getting to know more about who brings it to you is perhaps the last thing on any self-respecting surfer`s mind. But a tribute, is a tribute and given that one cyber year is, like, equivalent to 10 calendar years, Yahoo! could well be celebrating its 100th.

The past decade has perhaps been one of the most exciting for the World Wide Web and Yahoo! is a name that`s almost synonymous with Net users globally. It wasn`t always that way, especially for Yahoo! A couple of Stanford students cooped up in their trailer home, which also doubled as a computer lab was where Yahoo! was conceived and born. It was the product of the coupling of the two young and eminently potent minds of grad students Jerry Yang and David Filo who started it off as "Jerry and David`s Guide to the World Wide Web" to keep track of their favourite sites. It ignited the imaginations of all those who heard about it, and on the vibrant Stanford campus, word spread like wildfire. In 1995 with a bit of help, the cyber duo incorporated Yahoo! and to use a cliché, there`s been no turning back ever since.

Just a year later, in 1996, Yahoo! broadened its horizon and first appearing as a blip on the radar screens of Japan, Canada, UK and Ireland, Germany and France, it took the world by storm. India was, then a little low on Yahoo`s priorities, but it didn`t really need to come half way across the world on a jetliner. Cyberspace bridged that gap and millions of Indian netizens were already hooked on to Yahoo! long before the company set up shop in the Sub-continent. It`s another matter that Shammi Kapoor had boomed the word in a song in Bollywood film Junglee making Yahoo! a household name when Jerry or David were still in their nappies.

In India, Yahoo! has already helped lonely singles meet, flirt, get together or marry. It`s helped mobilize support for global calamities like the recent tsunami and rallied public opinion as only a website can. But all of it is best said in the words of the founders themselves. In a letter posted on the website, here`s what the two had to say to Yahoo! users around the world.  "...Here at Yahoo!, our users are at the heart of everything we do, and we are excited to be able to celebrate our birthday with you. "As we take a moment to reflect back on the last 10 years, we think about how far Yahoo! and the Internet have come.  We`ve grown from a short list of websites we thought were cool, to Yahoo! now, the most heavily trafficked Internet destination in the world, touching the lives of more than 300 million people every month.

 We know that we couldn`t have gotten here without you, our loyal users. "We thought Yahoo! Inc.`s 10th birthday would be a great excuse to take a look back and think about how the Internet has developed over the last 10 years, becoming an essential part of all of our daily lives. We`ve created a special site, Yahoo! Netrospective: 10 years, which celebrates the web`s history over the last decade.  We hope it will take you on a trip down memory lane, in a format we think is really cool.

"All of us at Yahoo! are already working on the next 10 years and are certain that over the next decade Yahoo! will be even more exciting, more innovation-filled, and even more essential to you, our users. "It`s been a great ride, and you know what? We think the best is yet to come." (Signed) David Filo & Jerry Yang, Founders of Yahoo!

In true Pan-American spirit, Yahoo! Inc. tied up with Baskin-Robbins to give away free ice-cream to all Yahoo! users all day on 2 March, 2005, through 3,423 select outlets of the ice-cream chain worldwide. Registered Yahoo! users were urged to download a coupon and redeem it at designated Baskin-Robbins counters for a free 2.5-oz scoop of their favourite flavour -in cup or cone. The footprint covered Canada, UK, South Korea, New Zealand, Malaysia, Hawaii and Alaska.

India didn`t figure on the list, but perhaps they`re waiting till Yahoo! India turns 10! But why worry about the ice-cream. Bring out the champagne and raise a virtual toast to the 10-year-old! Cheers! Yahoo! 

Milestones in the Yahoo! history 

Incorporation

In a trailer on the Stanford campus, grad students Jerry Yang and David Filo keep track of their favourite web sites. News of their online directory quickly spreads. In `95 Yahoo! is incorporated and soon becomes the world`s most visited web site.

Verisign

Technophobes mistrust the Web until VeriSign arrives on the scene in `95 and comforts millions of would-be e-commerce customers. The encryption company goes

public in `98 and gives shopaholics much-needed peace of mind as they spend money online. Yahoo! signs up!

Black Thursday

For 48 hours in Feb. `96 Yahoo! starts to show its colors by turning its pages black to support Black Thursday and a web-wide protest against Internet censorship. In Oct. `01 it turns the front page pink to show support for breast cancer research.

Global

Yahoo! goes global in `96 with Y! Japan, Canada, UK and Ireland, Germany, and France. More than 20 international Yahoo! sites serve more than 160 million registered users in over 15 different languages.

Directions

Bulky phone directories and hard-to-fold paper maps could go the way of the LP. In `96, Switchboard creates a yellow pages web site; Yahoo! Maps and MapQuest launch interactive map services. Soon every major web portal boasts a phone directory and maps.

Personalization

My Yahoo! and Infoseek Personal news service launch in `96, and users handpick their online content—from sports scores and stock quotes to weather and entertainment info. It`s just the start of increased personalization of the web experience.

Webkids

The first generation to grow up on the Web logs on to Yahooligans! in spring `96. Kids soon become savvy searchers, finding everything from homework help to the yuckiest sites, as they follow their cartoon heroes off the TV screen and onto the computer.

E-mail

Offering the first free web-based email, Hotmail launches with a fizzle in `96. But word of mouth turns fizzle to sizzle, and potential competitors take note. Free email with huge storage like Yahoo! Mail continues to provide an alternative to "snail mail."

Online Photos

Between `97 and `99, digital camera prices drop to around $300. Sites like Yahoo! Photos, Shutterfly, and Ofoto make it easy to upload and share photos on the Web. Rather than bore friends with old-fashioned prints, inboxes are now clogged with online albums.

Birth of the blog

In December `97, only a handful of personal web pages with news links and commentary exist. Jorn Barger is the first to truncate "web log" to name his own Robot Wisdom Weblog. A phenomenon called the "blog" is born.

Chat

From Clinton (first presidential chat) and Koko (first "interspecies" chat) to the historic online meeting of Mahathir Mohamad, Yasser Arafat, and Fidel Ramos, web

news chat makes big headlines, while Yahoo! Messenger and Yahoo! Chat continue to attract heavy traffic.

Dating

Personals go online as romantics make a match by posting pictures and profiles. While specialized sites help like-minded lovers meet, Yahoo! Personals starts hooking up countless numbers of happy couples.

Shopping

As Yahoo! Shopping opens its doors and Amazon.com adds music to its wares, online buying gains momentum in time for the holidays. Despite tech glitches, powerhouse auction site eBay wins big on its IPO, as consumers flock to fill their virtual carts.

Spam

By `99, junk mail is such a problem that federal legislators step in. Were they annoyed by email offers to enlarge their constituency with no money down? The emergence of Yahoo!`s spam filter and others later help ease one of the Net`s deepest time-sinks.

Mars Rover

Space may be the final frontier, but it was also pretty boring--until NASA gave its fans a mission they could follow online. Its webcast of the Rover`s Mars landing did wonders for the space agency and helped all of us see how far the Net can reach.

Slammerworm

In `03, a worm almost brings down the entire Net. Attacking Microsoft SQL servers, the Slammer Worm leaves a trail of melted routers and overburdened ISPs. The fastest-spreading worm the Web has ever seen, Slammer sets the bar for malicious computing.

Browser wars

After Microsoft crushed Netscape, the company Gates built continued to lead the world in both operating systems (remember Windows `95`s midnight release?) and Internet browsers. But in `04, early adopters have a new option when Mozilla`s Firefox launches.

Tsunami

When a tsunami slams into South Asia in Dec. `04, killing over 280,000, the world and the web community respond with unprecedented speed and generosity. Like countless others, Yahoo! users respond as a community to raise millions for disaster relief.