E-commerce B2C product sales totaled $142.5 billion, representing about 8% of retail product sales in the United States.
The United States online retail industry will be worth $279 billion this year. Online stores must describe products for sale with text, photos, and multimedia files, whereas in a physical retail store, the actual product and the manufacturer's packaging must be available for direct inspection.
1972 Electronic mail is introduced by Ray Tomlinson at Cambridge Massachusetts
1973 TCP/IP and FTP is designed to allow communication and file sharing from computer to computer
1974 The word "internet" is used for the first time
1984 Domain Name System (DNS) is established with network addresses identified by .com .org .edu
1986 Quantum Computer Services which later changes names to American Online debuts
1989 The World (world.std.com) debuts as the first dial-up Internet access for consumers
1989 Tim Berners-Lee develops hypertext and hyperlinks giving the web it’s first graphical user interface
1990 The first internet index is created by Peter Deutsch who devices "Archie" an archive of FTP sites
1991 Gopher debuts which provides point-and-click navigation and becomes the most popular interface
1993 Mosaic becomes the dominant navigating system for the World Wide Web
1994 "Spamming" is coined as commerce sites launch mass marketing campaigns via email
1994 Marc Andreessen and Jim Clark start Netscape Communications and debut the Navigator browser
1994 Yahoo! is founded by Jerry Yang and David Filo
1995 CompuServe, America Online, and Prodigy start providing dial-up internet access
1995 Sun Microsystems releases the internet programming language Java
1995 AuctionWeb later named ebay is launched
1995 Amazon.com is launched and sells its first book
1995 Craigslist is created by Craig Newmark first as an email to friends of local social events
1996 45 million people are using the internet, 30 million of those are in the U.S. and Canada
1998 Google opens its first office in California
1999 College student Shawn Fanning invents Napster an music file sharing program
1999 The number of Internet users worldwide reaches 150 million, 75 million in the U.S.
1999 "E-commerce" becomes the new buzzword as internet shopping rapidly spreads
1999 MySpace.com is launched
2000 X.com and Confinity merge to form PayPal.com
2000 The internet bubble bursts as the Nasdaq stock plunges causing many dotcoms to close
2000 America Online buys Time Warner for $16 billion. It’s the biggest merger of all time
2001 Wikipedia is created
2002 58.8 % of the U.S. population uses the internet. Worldwide there are 544.2 million users
2003 An estimated 2.6 billion music files are being illegally downloaded each month
2003 Apple introduces iTunes Music Store allowing people to download songs for 99 cents each
2004 Facebook is launched by Mark
2004 Online spending reaches a record high – $117 billion
2005 YouTube.com is launched
2006 There are more than 92 million websites online
2006 Wikleaks.org is founded by Julian Assange
2006 Twitter.com is launched
2007 World of Warcraft surpasses 9 million subscribers worldwide
2007 Microsoft buys aQuantive for $6 billion in a move to catch up with Google
2008 Microsoft offers to buy Yahoo for $44.6 billion
2008 Wikileaks.org is launched
2012 There are now 2.267 billion Internet users worldwide
Here are the top selling products on the internet according to their annual sales and their market share:
Products
|
Annual Sales
|
Market Share
|
Software, Books, Music, Flowers
|
$37.05 billion
| 26% |
Computer Hardware, Consumer Electronics, Office Supplies
|
$22.8 billion
|
16%
|
Apparel, Footwear, Jewelry, Linens / Home Decor
|
$26 billion
|
13%
|
Health, Beauty, Food and Beverage
|
$11.4 billion
|
8%
|
Toys, Video Games, Sporting Goods
|
$9.975 billion
|
7%
|
Small Appliances, Furniture, Tools, Garden Equipment
|
$4.275 billion
|
3%
|
Best selling product ranking on the internet:
Rank
|
Best Selling Products
|
1
|
Women's Apparel
 |
2
|  |
3
|
Computer Hardware
 |
4
|
Computer Software
 |
5
|
Apparel
 |
6
|
Toys & Video Games
 |
7
|
Video DVDs
 |
8
|
Health & Beauty
 |
9
|
Consumer Electronics
 |
10
|
Music
 |
11
|
Jewelry
 |
12
|
Office Supplies
 |
13
|
Linens / Home Decor
 |
14
|
Flowers
 |
15
|  |
16
|
Footwear
 |
17
|
Small Appliances
 |
18
|
Tools & Garden
 |
19
|
Gifts
 |
The Internet History
Year Event
1969 Advanced Research Projects Agency goes online connecting four U.S. universities1972 Electronic mail is introduced by Ray Tomlinson at Cambridge Massachusetts
1973 TCP/IP and FTP is designed to allow communication and file sharing from computer to computer
1974 The word "internet" is used for the first time
1984 Domain Name System (DNS) is established with network addresses identified by .com .org .edu
1986 Quantum Computer Services which later changes names to American Online debuts
1989 The World (world.std.com) debuts as the first dial-up Internet access for consumers
1989 Tim Berners-Lee develops hypertext and hyperlinks giving the web it’s first graphical user interface
1990 The first internet index is created by Peter Deutsch who devices "Archie" an archive of FTP sites
1991 Gopher debuts which provides point-and-click navigation and becomes the most popular interface
1993 Mosaic becomes the dominant navigating system for the World Wide Web
1994 "Spamming" is coined as commerce sites launch mass marketing campaigns via email
1994 Marc Andreessen and Jim Clark start Netscape Communications and debut the Navigator browser
1994 Yahoo! is founded by Jerry Yang and David Filo
1995 CompuServe, America Online, and Prodigy start providing dial-up internet access
1995 Sun Microsystems releases the internet programming language Java
1995 AuctionWeb later named ebay is launched
1995 Amazon.com is launched and sells its first book
1995 Craigslist is created by Craig Newmark first as an email to friends of local social events
1996 45 million people are using the internet, 30 million of those are in the U.S. and Canada
1998 Google opens its first office in California
1999 College student Shawn Fanning invents Napster an music file sharing program
1999 The number of Internet users worldwide reaches 150 million, 75 million in the U.S.
1999 "E-commerce" becomes the new buzzword as internet shopping rapidly spreads
1999 MySpace.com is launched
2000 X.com and Confinity merge to form PayPal.com
2000 The internet bubble bursts as the Nasdaq stock plunges causing many dotcoms to close
2000 America Online buys Time Warner for $16 billion. It’s the biggest merger of all time
2001 Wikipedia is created
2002 58.8 % of the U.S. population uses the internet. Worldwide there are 544.2 million users
2003 An estimated 2.6 billion music files are being illegally downloaded each month
2003 Apple introduces iTunes Music Store allowing people to download songs for 99 cents each
2004 Facebook is launched by Mark
2004 Online spending reaches a record high – $117 billion
2005 YouTube.com is launched
2006 There are more than 92 million websites online
2006 Wikleaks.org is founded by Julian Assange
2006 Twitter.com is launched
2007 World of Warcraft surpasses 9 million subscribers worldwide
2007 Microsoft buys aQuantive for $6 billion in a move to catch up with Google
2008 Microsoft offers to buy Yahoo for $44.6 billion
2008 Wikileaks.org is launched
2012 There are now 2.267 billion Internet users worldwide
Some interesting statistics on internet users:
- There are approximately 1,359,872,109 people on the Internet.
- 78% of U.S. internet users are on Broadband
- It took the radio 38 years, the television 13 years, and the World Wide Web 4 years to reach 50 million users.
- 80% of all emails sent are spam
- Domain names are being registered at a rate of more than one million names every month.
- 80% of all pictures on the internet are of naked women.
- In 2010 1 of every 8 married couples in the U.S. met online
Percent of population on the internet:
North America 74%
Oceania / Australia 61%
Europe 53%
Latin America / Caribbean 31%
Middle East 28%
Asia 19%
Africa 6.5%
U.S. Internet Usage by Ethnicity:
Asian 73%
White 69%
Black 51%
Hispanic 48%
Internet Activity:
Average hours spent using a computer each month 66 Hours
Average hours spent on Facebook each month 7 Hours
Total web searches per month in the U.S. 11 Billion
Average hours spent watching streaming video each month 3 Hours
Total number of email sent daily 210 Billion
