The world’s first public website was launched on August 6, 1991, and it was… drumroll please… info.cern.ch!
Created by Tim Berners-Lee, the father of the World Wide Web, this humble website wasn’t exactly bells and whistles – it was hosted on a NeXT computer at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, and its main purpose was to provide information about the World Wide Web project itself.
Here’s what you would have seen if you visited info.cern.ch back in 1991:
- Plain text and hyperlinks: No fancy graphics or multimedia, just basic text with links to other websites (there weren’t many of those back then!).
- Technical information: The focus was on explaining how the Web worked, with details about HTML,HTTP, and other technical aspects.
- A call to action: Berners-Lee encouraged visitors to create their own websites and join the burgeoning web community.
While seemingly modest by today’s standards, info.cern.ch marked a pivotal moment in history. It was the first website anyone could access, paving the way for the digital revolution we live in today.
Interestingly, you can actually visit a recreation of the original info.cern.ch website! CERN launched a project in 2013 to restore the site, and you can now experience a slice of web history firsthand. Just head over to https://info.cern.ch/ to see how it all began.
