Thirty dollars a day bought the Harvard College Democrats advertising on thefacebook.com in spring 2004. Their message promoted a trip to New Hampshire. This small booking provides a useful starting…
A résumé records what someone has done professionally. A network can also reveal how a conversation might begin. The difference between those two kinds of information explains an important part…
Before click bids helped allocate Google's advertising positions, AdWords sold impressions. That easily overlooked distinction leads directly into the history of search advertising. The service launched in October 2000 already…
A website can declare itself the leading authority in its field. The claim becomes more interesting when other websites point to it. Even then, a difficult question remains: should every…
A large online catalogue solves one problem while creating another. It makes many products accessible, but leaves visitors with the work of finding what suits them. Amazon's early recommender systems…
A website about dogs did not need a warehouse to earn money from books. A cooking site did not need its own payment desk or dispatch department. In July 1996,…
The web's most famous early banner did not offer a discount. It asked: “Have you ever clicked your mouse right here? You will.” When HotWired launched on 27 October 1994,…