Ever feel like you keep hearing about the same real estate topics in the media over and over again. And wonder, why are we stuck talking about this subject. Has any progress really been made?
Sometimes if you step back and look in the rear view mirror, you can see just how far the real estate community has come. wwww.archive.org is a site dedicated to building a digital library of the history of popular websites. You can enter a web address into their "wayback machine" and get a snapshot of what a site looked like in years past. When you see where sites like http://www.realtor.com/ started, it is easier to see how far they have come. Fun to even look how much Zillow has changed in the 16 months since its launch.
Many times the pictures don't load well on the site, but you will get the main idea.
Realtor.com- Janaury 3, 2001 - http://web.archive.org/web/20010105182500/http://www.realtor.com/ (check out the little "search for a home" box in the upper left hand corner)
January 24, 2002 - http://web.archive.org/web/20011217043526/www.realtor.com/default.asp?hm=on&poe=realtor (guess they figured out people wanted to primarily search for homes on a real estate website)
January 4, 2003 - http://web.archive.org/web/20030603224911/realtor.com/Default.asp?poe=realtor (for the most part, this layout stuck until this year)
Zillow.com November 24, 2004 - http://web.archive.org/web/20041121055020/http://www.zillow.com/ (what was the site going to be??? Top secret at this time)
February 9, 2006 - http://web.archive.org/web/20060209020550/http://zillow.com/ (the pictures load funny, but a lot of progress has been made in a year)
Others Worth Noting
HomeGain- May 10, 2000 - http://web.archive.org/web/20000510005354/http://www.homegain.com/
ActiveRain.com - July 9, 2005 - http://web.archive.org/web/20051028051122/activerain.com/
Remax.com - August 15, 2000- http://web.archive.org/web/20000815105139/http://www.remax.com/index.html
Homes.com- May 30, 2000 - http://web.archive.org/web/20000530222829/http://www8.homes.com/
Realestate.com - March 1, 2000 - http://web.archive.org/web/20000301172838/http://www.realestate.com/
Craigslist.com - November 10, 1999 - http://web.archive.org/web/19991110033547/http://www.craigslist.com/ (when Craig used to just be a San Fran thing)
Feel free to post any fun links you discover on the website!
Warning- You can waste a lot of time on this site!
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Is it coincidence that you picked my birthday for the date you looked at ActiveRain? That version of the site was just an ad for the original ActiveRain which was a lead management system for brokers to hook into their site...........not nearly as successful as what it would become upon official launch in June of 2006 :)
Well thanks a lot........I'll be playing on this the rest of the night............:)
Amazing at how quickly this technology is changing as more people jump inot the fray
Kathy Anderson
Sara, I don't want to look back, but I'm counting on you for keeping me focussed on the future.
Bill Roberts