History of Email

Explore the 'easter eggs' and key events that shaped modern email. This section covers the milestones, from Ray Tomlinson's first 'QWERTYUIOP' message and the symbol to the 'April Fool's' launch of Gmail and the Monty Python origin of 'spam'. It's the logbook of the first voyages that built our digital trade routes.

23 questions in this topic

When was the first email sent? Who invented email? How has email evolved over time? What were early email systems like? What was ARPANET and its role in email? How did the “@” symbol become part of email addresses? When did MIME get introduced? When did HTML email become common? When did spam first appear? What were the earliest anti-spam measures? When did email marketing start? When did commercial ESPs appear? How did email evolve from local to cloud-based systems? When did Gmail launch and how did it change email? How did deliverability become a discipline? When did authentication protocols (SPF, DKIM, DMARC) emerge? What milestones shaped secure email (TLS, PGP, S/MIME)? How has mobile changed how people read email? How have privacy laws affected email history? How did open tracking and analytics begin? What are some defunct protocols or systems (X.400, UUCP, Lotus Notes)? How did spam evolve into phishing? How has AI and filtering changed email in the 2020s?

Questions about History of Email