If it is important to you for the internet to be a, "wonderful, weird, occasionally terrible, but always transformative place to be"...you may be interested in "Popular Mechanics" list of the 50 most important websites of all time..

Remember around 1993 getting that AOL disc in the mail that you had to install in your computer?

After the whirring and beeping of your dial-up modem mercifully ended, you were greeted with a one-stop-shop that let you browse headlines, read horoscopes, and check your “mail.” It was magic.

 

Some of the other '90s sites include AOL . . . Amazon . . . Yahoo . . . eBay . . . Match.com . . . Craigslist . . . Hamster Dance . . . and Google.

By 1996, Amazon was making millions selling books on it's website.

Before long, Amazon had expanded to music, movies, clothing, household items, and ultimately everything else on the planet. And as Amazon the company branched off into web hosting, hardware, and robotics, Amazon.com has evolved to consume a bigger and bigger chunk of e-commerce. In 2018, the retail giant accounted for 37 cents of every dollar U.S. consumers spent online.

 

Then as they get into the 2000s, some of their picks are Wikipedia . . . Myspace . . . Facebook . . . YouTube . . . Reddit . . . Twitter . . . BuzzFeed . . . WikiLeaks . . . and Pornhub.

I still remember the days of searching through card files at the library, if I needed information on a particular topic.  Did I also mention that I had to walk a half-mile through snow covered streets to reach the bus stop.  I digress...

(Check out the full list of 50 here.)

(Popular Mechanics)

 

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