AOL Chat Rooms:
Started: mid-1990s
Now while this wasn’t technically a social networking site, it had many of the components of one. Who could forget spending time chatting with others about whatever interested you at the time. Despite the frequent shady characters who frequented many of the chats, it was one of the first places for both friends and strangers to build connections online. It helped establish an online community that would explode a decade later.
SixDegrees:
Started in 1997
SixDegrees.com claims to be the “first social networking site.” And, I admit this site started before I even had my own AOL screen name. (I was still logging into AOL Dial-up (of course) on my parents’ joint account.) The site was little more than an AIM profile (without the IM function). Get the picture? It couldn’t do much. Users could create profiles and list their friends.
Xanga:
Started in 1999
I don’t know about you, but Xanga was all the rage in my middle school. The site was a mix between a social media site and a blogging platform. While it doesn’t have the following it used to have, it still exists more than 10 years later. That cannot be said for SixDegrees and many other sites.
Friendster
Started on March 22, 2002
Friendster was arguably one of the first social networking sites to develop quite the following internationally. The site initially started as a way to compete with online dating sites like match.com, but quickly blossomed into much more. It paved the way for sites like Myspace, Facebook and Twitter.
