Many websites have influenced this planet (and the people that call this planet home). Here’s a list of 10 websites that changed the world (or maybe just my world).

This list is an opinion. You have the right to disagree with the placement of different websites on this list. If you do, please leave a comment, or even post your own list. It would be great to hear the ideas of other people. Everything affects everyone in different ways, so a website on this list could seem completely unimportant to you.

10. Napster.com
    
    

    Napster ranks in at #10 on our list.

    I must say, I do love free music. Who doesn’t? Actually, there’s one person that doesn’t. Damn you, Lars Ulrich! The affects that Napster had on the world are still visible today. According to a survey done back in 2008, the average teenager’s iPod (or other music device) has 800 pirated songs. The worst offenders are those between 18 and 24: 96% of people surveyed that fall under this age group said that they have stolen music in the past. Who can we thank for all of this? Napster.

    Napster started out as a free peer-to-peer music sharing website. After legal challenges from metal band Metallica, Napster was forced to close down. Napster later returned as a paid music service, a relic to look back upon everytime you steal a song.

9. Slashdot.com
   
   

   Slashdot, a social-bookmarking website, places at #9 in our list.

   Ah, Slashdot, the home of the geeks. It’s OK though, the nerds at this social website changed the world. Before Slashdot’s creation in 1997, there weren’t any huge social-bookmarking networks. Although you may not consider Slashdot to be a social-bookmarking site, the only visible difference between Slashdot and other social-bookmarking websites is that Slashdot includes a larger excerpt from the content on their front pages. This may give Slashdot the appearance of being a blog to someone who has never seen the website before, but it is a social-bookmarking website.

   Slashdot lead to many websites similar to it, such as Digg, Mixx, and Reddit, and a new way to discover things on the web. We now have three ways: from other websites, from search engines, and from other people on sites like Slashdot. I’m certain that Slashdot was not the first of it’s kind, but it seems to be the first mainstream site of it’s kind.

8. eBay.com
   
   

   eBay is #7 on our list (the Barack Obama potato chip just did it for me)

   eBay – the only place where you can bid on a potato chip with Barack Obama’s face on it. Isn’t eBay the greatest? Anyone can use eBay to attempt to sell their things or buy things that they ‘need’. Some people have even dedicated their life to buying and selling items on eBay for profit (it’s their ‘career’).

   eBay was one of the first websites that gave people (lots of people) the idea that they could actually profit on the Internet. The Internet wasn’t just a playplace for all of the nerds anyone, it was a place where any normal personal could earn money. Also, eBay is a great source of entertainment. I might just bid on that Barack Obama potato chip.

7. Yahoo.com
   
   

   Yahoo! is #6 in our list of websites that changed the world.

   I’ll start this one with a question: If Yahoo! never existed, would we have Google as it exists today? Maybe not. Yahoo! was one of the first powerful companies on the web. It started off as web directory, and then later evolved into a web portal. In the next few years, Yahoo! released Yahoo! Games, Yahoo! Mail (which is the largest free mail service today), Yahoo! Messanger, GeoCities, and Yahoo! Groups. Many more services have been added since then.

   Yahoo! influenced many websites and continues to influence them today. Maybe saying that without Yahoo! we wouldn’t have Google is an exaggeration, but Yahoo! was definitely important in the timeline of the web.

6. MySpace.com (and companion Friendster.com)
   
   

   MySpace (and Friendster) were two of the first massive social networks.

   MySpace, commonly referred as ‘Hell’, comes in #5 on our list. Other than being the largest shithole on the Internet, it has many positive attributes (I’m assuming that you classify being a shithole a negative attribute here.) MySpace (which started off of Friendster) paved the road for other large social networks. It was one of the first huge websites to integrate user interaction (and look how it turned out).

   Once again, MySpace wasn’t the first website of it’s kind. I’m fairly sure that Friendster wasn’t either, although it predates MySpace. These websites were the first to do it massively. Although I’d like to credit other websites to be the first, these websites were the first that were widely known, and, in the scheme of things, that’s what really matters.

5. Wikipedia.com
   
   

   Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, is #5 on our list.

   Ok, so we have a bunch of social network websites. And a bunch of encyclopedias that need updating. Let me think of a second. Oh, how about a Wiki? And that’s how Wikipedia started. It was something like that.

   With over 2.7 million articles in English, Wikipedia is the go to place for quick learning. Although some believe that content on Wikipedia cannot be trusted to be correct, with the shear volume of articles on the site at least a couple have to be correct. ;) Wikipedia grants us the ability to learn about anything in a matter of minutes. We can just search for it on the wiki, and then read all about it. With knowledge comes power.

   Wikipedia influenced many free Wiki websites. The Wiki format is also utilized by many projects.

4. YouTube.com
   
   

   YouTube, a huge video sharing website, ranks at #4 in our list.

   YouTube: a bunch of great videos, or a bunch of pointless shit? It’s hard to decide, but YouTube is still #3 on our list. It was created by three former PayPal employees and then purchased by Google for more than $1 billion. Anyone can view videos or post their own videos on YouTube. They have strict guidelines against pornographic material and copyrighted material, although some people try to upload that stuff anyway.

   YouTube influenced many video websites. It helped create a truly multimedia web. I often hear people talking about videos they watched on YouTube. It’s a great place to watch videos (for laughs or to learn) and a great place for people to share their stuff.

3. Facebook
   
   

   Facebook is the 3rd most influential website on the net.

   After mentioning MySpace and Friendster, we couldn’t leave Facebook out. After MySpace began to become popular, Facebook was created. Last year it was said that Facebook finally exceeded MySpace and is now the largest social network in the world.

   With many influential features, such as Facebook Connect, the Facebook Developer Platform, Facebook Chat, and many more, Facebook deserves this spot on our list. It attracts a large number of people across the world including normal users and developers. With Facebook’s dynamic development system, almost any application is possible. Facebook therefore has an unlimited number of features – a number of features only limited by the number of developers who wish to contribute.

2. Google
   
   

   Google is the second most influential website in the world.

   Was this expected? Or did you expect it to be #1? I’m fairly certain that you can’t find one person that uses the Internet and is unaware of Google. It’s possible that people who live under a rock wouldn’t recognize the search engine giant, but saying that an Internet user wouldn’t is just absurd.

   Google is huge. It has many parts: the search engine, AdSense, AdWords, Blogger, GMail, Feedburner, and much much more. Starting from just a small advertising company, it doesn’t seem like Google will stop expanding.

   There isn’t too much to write here – Google speaks for itself.

1. Every website in between. We have gone over a bunch of huge websites – most with billions of visitors. What about all of the websites inbetween those huge ones? Is it possible to have a search engine without web pages to search for? No. Is it possible to have a social-bookmarking website without websites to bookmark? No. So, instead of giving #1 to a single website, I give it to every website. All of the smaller websites on the net support the websites at the top – without small websites, nothing would be possible.

Ah, that was a lot! Thanks for taking to read this (or did you tl;dr? :)). It would be great to hear a few comments (post them below!) Again, thanks for reading.