15 March 1985
ICANN dates the registration of symbolics.com, the first second-level name under .com, to 15 March 1985. “Symbolics” is the name and “.com” is the extension. The wording matters: this was the first .com, not the first website.
The Internet and the Web are not the same age
CERN dates Tim Berners-Lee’s invention of the World Wide Web to 1989. Domain names therefore existed before this system of linked pages.
Source : CERN — The birth of the Web
Why this old story still helps
Registering a domain name still does not create a website today. It reserves a name within an extension under the applicable terms. The services that use it then need to be arranged.
Your business might use it for email, for a website or to redirect visitors elsewhere. Different providers can supply these services. Replacing a website does not necessarily mean changing its domain name; replacing email does not necessarily mean rebuilding the website.
This distinction makes discussions with providers easier. Ask who the domain registrant is, who hosts the site and who supplies email. You will get more useful answers than from treating everything as a single service.
Symbolics.com is a small time capsule. Its practical lesson is to distinguish the name your business uses from the services operating behind it.
Put it into practice
Explore the related Wize guideSources
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