Twenty years ago today, on January 8, 1995, the Baltimore Sun reprinted a Dallas Morning News story about the Web. It was called, “What’s floating in cyberspace? Just about everything.”
Here is an excerpt:
“Call it the Year of the ‘Net, the turning point where everyone with anything to say, sing or display raced to stake a claim in cyberspace.
….True, only a few million Americans are currently using their computers and modems to get on-line. But from all the hype, that was hard to remember.
Deals were announced daily. Record companies, movie studios, book publishers and television networks couldn’t get on-line fast enough. By the end of the year, all three major television networks had extensive offerings on at least one of the three major on-line services, America Online, CompuServe and Prodigy.
….Even the on-line services began to look suspiciously like fledgling TV networks. On Election Night, all three major services offered their own coverage. It was ragged and couldn’t compete with TV, but it was a start.
Come 1996, expect full campaign coverage from the computer. For that matter, expect the candidates themselves to reach out through cyberspace, hoping to bypass the mass media and go one-on-one with voters.
….In the coming year, cyberspace is bound to get more crowded, the things out there to do will get cooler, rates will drop and quality will improve. It’s no longer a question of who will be out there; it’s more a question of who won’t be.”
This video takes a look at various website homepages from 1994-2006.
To give you some perspective about online news during the middle 1990s, I’ve compiled a partial list of media sites launched between 1992-1996.
Some names are listed twice because before they appeared on the Web, they were first posted on services like AOL, Prodigy, CompuServe, Interchange, BBS or Delphi.
1996
The New York Times, January 1996
El Tiempo (Bogota, Columbia), January 1996
WRAL-TV (Raleigh, NC), January 1996
The Washington Times, January 1996
Chicago Tribune, March 1996
Toronto Star, March 1996
Mail & Guardian (South Africa), April 1996
Los Angeles Times, April 1996
Wall Street Journal, April 1996
WCCO-TV (Minneapolis, MN), April 1996
El Pais (Spain), May 1996
Christian Science Monitor, May 1996
Miami Herald, June 1996
The Washington Post, June 1996
MSNBC, July 15, 1996
New York Daily News, October 1996
Lexington (Ky.) Herald-Leader, kentuckyconnect.com, Dec. 15, 1996
South China Morning Post (Hong Kong), December 19961995
Slate Magazine, February 1995
St. Petersburg Times/Tampa Bay Times, February 1995
USA Today, USA Today Online, April 1995
ZDNet, April 1995
The Guardian (London), April 1995
The Philadelphia Inquirer, Philadelphia Online, April 1995
The Age (Australia), April 1995
The Lawrence Journal-World, May 1995
Die Welt, (Germany), May 1995
Houston Chronicle, June 1995
Washington Post, Digital Ink, July 1995
KHON-TV (Honolulu, HI), July 1995
Detroit News, July 1995
Orlando Sentinel, July 1995
Asahi Shimbun (Japan), August 1995
Boston Globe, Boston.com, October 1995
KVIA-TV (El Paso, TX), November 1995
Salon Magazine, November 1995
Denver Post, November 1995
La Nacion (Argentina), December 1995
Star Tribune, Star Tribune Online, 1995
Gainesville Sun, Sun.One, 1995
Richmond Times-Dispatch, Gateway Virginia, 1995
St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Post-Link, 1995
The Arizona Republic, 1995
The Times of London (England), 1995
ABC, 1995
CNN, 1995
CBS, 1995
FOX, 1995
NBC, 1995
WGBH-TV (Boston), 1995
WRTV-TV (Indianapolis), 1995
Le Monde (France), 1995
The Jerusalem Post, 19951994
Salt Lake Tribune, Utah Online, January 1994
Detroit Free Press, January 1994
Raleigh News & Observer, Nando.Net, Nando Times, February 1994
The Atlanta Journal and Constitution, Access Atlanta, March 1994
CNET, March 1994
BBC, April 13, 1994
Columbus Dispatch, May 1994
The New York Times, @ Times, June 1994 (America Online)
ESPN, July 1994
Tampa Tribune, Tampa Bay Online, August 1994
Newsday, Newsday Direct, October 1994
Wired Magazine, Hot Wired, October 1994
Los Angeles Times, TimesLink, October 26, 1994
London Daily Telegraph, Electronic Telegraph, November 1994
San Francisco Chronicle, The Gate, November 1994
Financial Times, November 1994
San Jose Mercury News, Mercury Center, December 1994
Dallas Morning News, 1994
The Irish Times, 19941993
Florida Today, FlaToday, February 1993
San Jose Mercury News, Mercury Center, May 1993
Forbes Magazine, June 1993
Time Online, September 1993
Danbury News-Times, September 1993
Arizona Republic, October 1993
NPR, Dec. 1993
U.S. News & World Report, December 19931992
St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Post-Link, January 1992
CNN, CNN Newsroom, October 1992
Chicago Tribune, Chicago Online, 1992
Charlotte Observer, Observer Online, 1992
While we’re looking at the history of online news, let’s go back another twelve years to describe what is probably the first online newspaper.
On July 1, 1980, the Columbus Dispatch went online. It was part of a CompuServe and Associated Press experiment about the potential of online papers. Other newspapers from around the country also participated in this text-only service.
When the CompuServe project ended in 1982, a new electronic newspaper began. The Fort Worth Star-Telegram launched its “StarText” computer BBS (Bulletin Board System) on May 3, 1982.
Online news continued to transform and by 1995 you could clearly see that the Web, and digital news, was here to stay.
Crome’s look at the evolution of the Web includes a number of sites from the middle 1990s.
