Just as quickly as new, more exciting things are created here on the internet, the exciting ideas of yesteryear fade off into internet obscurity.
In the spirit of remembering where we came from, here’s a quick look back at a few sites and services we thought we would never be able to live without!
BEBO
Profile from Bebo.com
For many of us Bebo was our first real foray into the exciting new world that we now call social networking.
Bebo launched back in 2005, and just five days after it’s launch already had 1 million users. It was a new, exciting way for us to share pictures, events and random thoughts with whoever would listen. Bebo quickly grew so large it overtook MySpace as the most widely used form of social networking used in many parts of the world. At the height of it’s popularity Bebo has 10.7 million unique users and was sold to AOL for a whopping $805 million in 2008.
Just as quickly as we started using Bebo, we embraced the shiny new platform called Facebook. As users abandoned ship en masse the company was sold once again and then declared bankrupt. Bebo is now owned by it’s original creators, with the social networking side of things being retired for good. Bebo now classes itself as a company that dreams up ideas for fun social apps.
MSN MESSENGER
Windows Live Messenger
Once describing itself as ‘The Future of Messaging’ MSN messenger allowed us to quickly communicate with friends and family from all around the world, quicker and easier than ever before.
Originally launching back in 1999 the numbers steadily grew until 330 million of us were actively using the service each month.
The program received many updates with new features being added often including being renamed Windows Live Messenger. This was until Microsoft purchased Skype in May 2011 for $8.5 billion.
Microsoft began merging Messenger and Skype accounts and then announced that on 15 March 2013 the service would stop working for most users. If you’re after a bit of a blast from the past you can still download the software as part of the Windows Essentials bundle from Microsoft and then use the Messenger Reviver patch to bring it back to life.
So there you have it! We hope you enjoyed the little trip down memory lane. If there is something else you would love to know what ever happened to please let us know in the comments below or on our Facebook page and we will let you know in future blog posts.
