e-commerce

The ARPANET is used to arrange a cannabis sale between students at the Stanford Artificial Intelligence Laboratory and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, later described as "the seminal act of e-commerce" in John Markoff's book What the Dormouse Said

Michael Aldrich demonstrates the first online shopping system

Thomson Holidays UK is first business-to-business online shopping system to be installed

Gateshead SIS/Tesco is first B2C online shopping system and Mrs Snowball, 72, is the first online home shopper

In April 1984, CompuServe launches the Electronic Mall in the USA and Canada. It is the first comprehensive electronic commerce service

California becomes first US state to enact an Electronic Commerce Act defining basic consumer rights online

Tim Berners-Lee writes the first web browser, WorldWideWeb, using a NeXT computer

Book Stacks Unlimited in Cleveland opens a commercial sales website (www.books.com) selling books online with credit card processing

The US National Science Foundation lifts its former strict prohibition of commercial enterprise on the Internet

Jeff Bezos launches Amazon.com

Electronic postal stamps can be purchased and downloaded for printing from the Web

Alibaba Group is established in China. Business.com sold for US $7.5 million to eCompanies, which was purchased in 1997 for US $149,000. The peer-to-peer filesharing software Napster launches. ATG Stores launches to sell decorative items for the home online

Business.com acquired by R.H. Donnelley for $345 million