Summary:

Owen Thomas is one of the most prominent voices in modern web media. He is currently the editor in chief of ReadWrite.com, but he was also the west coast editor for Business Insider, the founding editor of Daily Dot, executive editor of VentureBeat, managing editor of Valleywag… and I could go on and on… Business 2.0, Red Herring, etc. I was particularly excited to talk to Owen about some of his earliest jobs, at HotWired and at Suck. Owen gives us some more great background about the launch of Hotwired and the inner workings of Suck.

Sponsor link:

audibletrial.com/internethistory

Summary:

Soon after the founding of Wired Magazine, it was decided that Wired needed a major web presence. Andrew Anker was recruited to write a business plan and launch a website that would become HotWired.com. As we’ve seen in this chapter, HotWired was among the first stand-alone media websites, and pioneered a great many things, not the least of which were the first banner ads. Andrew gives us some wonderful insights into the early days of Wired (going back to the magazine’s funding) as well as the evolution of HotWired, Suck, Hotbot and other early web properties he helped bring to life.

Summary:

We continue our survey of early web media plays with some that have lasted the test of time and some that, while not currently extant, were lasting in terms of impact. It’s a big episode. WSJ.com. NYTimes.com. EOnline. The Weather Channel. ZDNet. CNet. Salon. Slate. Wired magazine and HotWired.com. And our long lost, beloved Suck.com.

By the way, as promised, here are some early NYTimes screenshots, compliments of Rich Meislin.

Here is a screenshot of @Times on AOL

And here’s an early NYTimes.com homepage

Bibliography:

•  The Weather Channel Book
•  http://www.newrepublic.com/article/116087/weather-channel-website-chases-storms-clicks
•  http://thevane.gawker.com/the-new-weather-com-is-a-sad-shell-of-its-former-self-1550958111
•  Bamboozled at the Revolution: How Big Media Lost Billions in the Battle for the Internet 1st edition by Motavalli, John published by Viking Adult Hardcover
•  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ZDNet
•  Architects of the Web: 1,000 Days that Built the Future of Business
•  http://www.thefreelibrary.com/ZIFF-DAVIS+UNIFIES+ITS+ONLINE+SERVICES+UNDER+A+NEW+NAME%3a+ZD+NET-a017072062
•  http://www.businessweek.com/1999/99_30/b3639039.htm
•  http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0780435/
•  http://www.informationweek.com/cnet-to-buy-ziff-davis/d/d-id/1008822?
•  http://www.fundinguniverse.com/company-histories/cnet-networks-inc-history/
•  http://www.salon.com/2005/11/14/salon_history/
•  http://www.businessweek.com/stories/1996-10-20/honey-whats-on-microsoft
•  The Highwaymen: Warriors of the Information Superhighway
•  http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/slates_10th_anniversary/2006/06/my_history_of_slate.html
•  http://archive.wired.com/wired/archive/2.10/mosaic.html?pg=5&topic=
•  http://www.keepgoing.org/issue20_giant/the_big_fish.html
•  Wired – A Romance

Summary:

Rob Glaser was, and is, the founder and CEO of Real Networks. If you were around in the 90s, you’ll remember Real Audio and Real Video and the Real Media player. In the age before broadband, Real Networks pioneered streaming media on the web. Quite simply, the early web would not have been multimedia without Real, and by the late 90s, fully 85% of the streaming audio and video on the web was Real Media. But Rob was also an early Microsoft Executive, so the interview starts out with Rob giving us some fascinating stories about being recruited to join Microsoft in the early 1980s as well as his work with the successful relaunch of Microsoft Word and Excel in the mid 80s.

Summary:

What the mid-1990's debate about the so-called "clipper chip" can teach us about our contemporary debates concerning NSA surveillance of the Internet and the Web.

This episode was originally written as a piece on Medium, entitled The NSA Tried This Before, What The 90s Debate Over The Clipper Chip Can Teach Us About Digital Privacy