2003
July 1, 2003: CLASSMATES.COM: In collaboration with 20th Century Fox Television, Classmates.com produces the first reality TV show based on a social network. The show followed Classmates.com members while they were searching for former classmates they haven’t seen in more than 10 years.
2004
December 27, 2004: WORLD OF WARCRAFT. A 13-year-old Chinese boy died after jumping from a building while re-enacting an event from World of Warcraft. Before jumping, the boy had played 36 hours of World of Warcraft without a break in a “game hall”. The parents of the boy sued the game's Chinese distributor Aomeisoft for $12,500.
2005
March 2005: FLICKR. Yahoo! acquired Flickr from Canadian software company Ludicorp. Between June 26 and July 2, all content was transferred from servers in Canada to servers in the U.S., making all content subject to U.S. federal law.
May 2005: WORLD OF WARCRAFT: WOW player Ben Schulz from Lafayette, Colo. published a video showing his WOW character (Leeroy Jenkins) running into a battle shouting his name, ruining a long planning session and killing the team. The video became so popular that Blizzard Entertainment, the company that created the game, hired Schulz to be the official announcer at WOW convention tournaments.
September 13, 2005: WORLD OF WARCRAFT: World of Warcraft developed “corrupted blood,” an in-game affliction capable of quickly killing lower-level characters. It was meant to be temporary and only inflicted by difficult bosses, but players found ways to use non-characters as carriers to inflict other characters. Blizzard did a hard reset of their servers to get rid of the disease, and epidemic researchers have used the incident as a model of how people could react to real-world epidemics.
November 3, 2005. WORLD OF WARCRAFT. A young girl from China died after continuous WOW play. The actual cause of death was not released, but her online gaming friends said she was complaining of fatigue for days but continued playing. Since then, posts throughout WOW online communities remind players not to neglect their physical needs while engaging in continued game play.
December 2005: XANGA. Fourteen-year-old, homeschool student Kara Borden and her 18-year-old boyfriend, David Ludwig, both from Pennsylvania, shoot Borden’s parents in the head and killed them afteran hour-long argument over thei relationship.. They both fled the scene shortly after. Authorities used the teenagers’ Xanga pages to look for possible clues, and incriminating posts helped lead to Ludwig’s conviction and sentencing. Ludwig is sentenced to life in jail without the possibility of parole, and Borden is free and living with relatives. (Amanda)
2006
February 28, 2006. WORLD OF WARCRAFT: Teammates in WOW held an in-game memorial for a fellow player who died. A rival team attacked the players’ characters during the memorial, killing all of the team’s characters.
April 2006: XANGA. Xanga, one of China’s more-popular teen social media sites, began decreasing in followers. The site’s biggest demographic in China, 13 to 18, said that pressure from friends to constantly comment on blog posts and parents becoming more savvy with the site contributed to declining interest.
June 2006: YOUTUBE. Videos posted by YouTube user LonelyGirl15 about her daily life as a teenager became an instant sensation and the second-most subscribed YouTube channel. LonelyGirl15 identified herself as “Bree,” a California teenager. Weeks later, it turned out that she was in fact an Australian actress in her 20s, and that the series was scripted by professional filmmakers. Despite the revelations, the videos became a mini series and generated over 110 million views.
September 2006. XANGA: Xanga was fined $1 million for violating the Child Privacy Act (CPA). From 2001 to 2006, approximately 1.7 million children under the age of 13 made Xanga profiles. The CPA states that it is illegal for anyone under 13 to make an information-sharing page on a website without parental notification and consent.
October 2006. GOOGLE: Google paid $1.65 billion for stock in YouTube. YouTube’s employees kept their jobs and much of the site’s structure and purpose was kept intact. Although Google bought out YouTube, the names were kept as a separate entity providing a each company with its own identity.
December 2006. FLICKR: Flickr increased the upload limits on free accounts. Free account holders were originally only allowed to upload 20 MB per month, but Flickr increased this to 100 MB per month, and eliminated restrictions on Pro accounts. It is estimated that Flickr hosts more than five billion images today.
July 1, 2003: CLASSMATES.COM: In collaboration with 20th Century Fox Television, Classmates.com produces the first reality TV show based on a social network. The show followed Classmates.com members while they were searching for former classmates they haven’t seen in more than 10 years.
2004
December 27, 2004: WORLD OF WARCRAFT. A 13-year-old Chinese boy died after jumping from a building while re-enacting an event from World of Warcraft. Before jumping, the boy had played 36 hours of World of Warcraft without a break in a “game hall”. The parents of the boy sued the game's Chinese distributor Aomeisoft for $12,500.
2005
March 2005: FLICKR. Yahoo! acquired Flickr from Canadian software company Ludicorp. Between June 26 and July 2, all content was transferred from servers in Canada to servers in the U.S., making all content subject to U.S. federal law.
May 2005: WORLD OF WARCRAFT: WOW player Ben Schulz from Lafayette, Colo. published a video showing his WOW character (Leeroy Jenkins) running into a battle shouting his name, ruining a long planning session and killing the team. The video became so popular that Blizzard Entertainment, the company that created the game, hired Schulz to be the official announcer at WOW convention tournaments.
September 13, 2005: WORLD OF WARCRAFT: World of Warcraft developed “corrupted blood,” an in-game affliction capable of quickly killing lower-level characters. It was meant to be temporary and only inflicted by difficult bosses, but players found ways to use non-characters as carriers to inflict other characters. Blizzard did a hard reset of their servers to get rid of the disease, and epidemic researchers have used the incident as a model of how people could react to real-world epidemics.
November 3, 2005. WORLD OF WARCRAFT. A young girl from China died after continuous WOW play. The actual cause of death was not released, but her online gaming friends said she was complaining of fatigue for days but continued playing. Since then, posts throughout WOW online communities remind players not to neglect their physical needs while engaging in continued game play.
December 2005: XANGA. Fourteen-year-old, homeschool student Kara Borden and her 18-year-old boyfriend, David Ludwig, both from Pennsylvania, shoot Borden’s parents in the head and killed them afteran hour-long argument over thei relationship.. They both fled the scene shortly after. Authorities used the teenagers’ Xanga pages to look for possible clues, and incriminating posts helped lead to Ludwig’s conviction and sentencing. Ludwig is sentenced to life in jail without the possibility of parole, and Borden is free and living with relatives. (Amanda)
2006
February 28, 2006. WORLD OF WARCRAFT: Teammates in WOW held an in-game memorial for a fellow player who died. A rival team attacked the players’ characters during the memorial, killing all of the team’s characters.
April 2006: XANGA. Xanga, one of China’s more-popular teen social media sites, began decreasing in followers. The site’s biggest demographic in China, 13 to 18, said that pressure from friends to constantly comment on blog posts and parents becoming more savvy with the site contributed to declining interest.
June 2006: YOUTUBE. Videos posted by YouTube user LonelyGirl15 about her daily life as a teenager became an instant sensation and the second-most subscribed YouTube channel. LonelyGirl15 identified herself as “Bree,” a California teenager. Weeks later, it turned out that she was in fact an Australian actress in her 20s, and that the series was scripted by professional filmmakers. Despite the revelations, the videos became a mini series and generated over 110 million views.
September 2006. XANGA: Xanga was fined $1 million for violating the Child Privacy Act (CPA). From 2001 to 2006, approximately 1.7 million children under the age of 13 made Xanga profiles. The CPA states that it is illegal for anyone under 13 to make an information-sharing page on a website without parental notification and consent.
October 2006. GOOGLE: Google paid $1.65 billion for stock in YouTube. YouTube’s employees kept their jobs and much of the site’s structure and purpose was kept intact. Although Google bought out YouTube, the names were kept as a separate entity providing a each company with its own identity.
December 2006. FLICKR: Flickr increased the upload limits on free accounts. Free account holders were originally only allowed to upload 20 MB per month, but Flickr increased this to 100 MB per month, and eliminated restrictions on Pro accounts. It is estimated that Flickr hosts more than five billion images today.
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