See the Original Pages of Some of the Biggest Websites on the Internet

All things have a beginning. And for many of the most-visited websites on the internet, these beginnings may be as humble as a guy with a laptop sitting at the kitchen table. Before the millions of hits and teams of computer science grads created the slick look of today's biggest sites, many websites began with a simple page.

This article takes a look back at the humble origins of some of the biggest websites on the internet. Just click on the links to see what these sites looked like back in the day. With some of them, you can even search the entire site as it was years ago.

We might as well start with one of the biggest...

Google
Online since September 15, 1997, Google has become one of the most-visited websites in the world. Before Google became a household word, it began as simple way to conduct a better search. To see what Google looked like on November 11, 1998 - a little over a year after it began, click HERE.

To see what the search page looked like click HERE.

You Tube
It's hard for me to imagine a world without You Tube, but the world's biggest supplier of stupid home videos has only been around since February 15, 2005. A couple hundred million videos ago, You Tube looked like THIS. This snapshot of You Tube is from April 28, 2005 (about two months after You Tube came online).

eBay
Online since August 4, 1995, eBay is one of the most-visited sites on the planet. Click HERE to view a snapshot of eBay from June 14, 1997.

To view eBay's main page from that era click HERE.

AOL
Back in the day, AOL was king of the internet mountain. At its peak, with 30 million subscribers hearing "You've Got Mail", AOL seemed poised to take over the world. How times have changed. If you were one of the early subscribers, you would have been greeted with THIS PAGE from December 20, 1996.

Wikipedia
The ultimate encyclopedia to some. The ultimate source of errors to others. Wikipedia has grown exponentially since its online debut on January 13, 2001. Click HERE to see what Wikipedia looked on August 8, 2001, shortly after it started.

Digg
In 1998 had you typed www.digg.com into your browser you would have gotten what appears to be a record store (which you can see HERE).

Digg as we know it today began in December 2004 with a page looking like THIS.

A year later Digg looked like THIS.

Associated Content
Here's a PAGE that should be near and dear to every content producer's heart. This one is from March 24, 2004.

By September 2004, had you clicked on Associated Content you would have seen THIS.

Then in December, AC looked like THIS.

By February 2005, AC began to look a bit more familiar, as you can see HERE.

In March, 2005 AC started to evolve, but it was still in transition. You can see this HERE.

By August, 2005 AC began to take its current shape -- which you can see HERE.

A year later, in August 2006, the site looked pretty much as it does today, with some interesting differences that you can see HERE.

THIS is exactly what AC looked like the day I signed up in December 2006.

Some Other Websites
Chances are if you've looked online for a job you've been to Monster.com. Back in 1996, THIS was the screen that would have greeted you.

If you needed to fly to that job interview, you might have checked Travelocity, which looked like THIS in 1996.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled present, already in progress.