20 Years of Online

In 1984, PC World cautiously recommends an exotic new communications technology.

Things We Miss: Webvan (1998-2001)

The pioneering Web grocer lost a fortune delivering everything from toilet paper to fresh Maine lobsters with style. It was fun while it lasted.

Forgotten Pioneer

The first spam slithered into in-boxes long before most people had in-boxes. Early Internet users say that a marketing rep at Digital Equipment Corporation sent the first unsolicited commercial e-mail on May 1, 1978. The message invited all 594 people with Arpanet accounts to product demonstrations. This is one innovator who's probably happy to go unremembered: Only the offender's e-mail address, THUERK at DEC-MARLBORO, still appears in the online record.

How do we spend our time?

Americans spent an average of 157 hours (6.5 days) using the Internet at home in 2002. If that seems like small (couch) potatoes, consider that we allocated an average of only 8 hours to the Net annually in 1996. The time that we spend on the Net at home has risen by 1863 percent since 1996--a far greater increase than for any other type of media. As a result, we have decreased the time we spend reading books and magazines by 9 percent over the same period. Still, for total time consumption, nothing compares with watching TV. On average, Americans spent 1663 hours (more than 69 whole days) staring at the tube in 2002.