The Website. How Long?

[Thomas Walker]

I just saw a thing on Pinterest that says the Website has been going since 1997. That number didn't sound right.

 

Of course, it was watchtower.org then, but still...

 

If that number is right, then it means we're at the 20th anniversary.

 

Anyone remember for sure?

[Qapla]

I am not sure of the exact date ... but, it was a long time back that a demo of a webpage/website was presented to the GB - I have a good reason to know this. And when Watchtower.org first went up it was not nearly as extensive as the site is today.

 

This may help:

Domain Name:WATCHTOWER.ORG
Domain ID: D419691-LROR
Creation Date: 1996-03-14T05:00:00Z

Edited July 28, 2017 by Qapla

[jwhess]

Here is the 1997 KM.  

*** km 11/97 p. 3 Good News on the Internet ***
Our Internet Web site has the address http://www.watchtower.org
 

[richietj77]

This is the oldest snapshot on the Internet Archive Wayback Machine site (catchy name):
https://web.archive.org/web/19970414054705/http://www.watchtower.org:80/

It could be the first year, that's the site I remember.

[Friends just call me Ross]

Use 'The Wayback' machine and check the startup date for yourself.

The Wayback Machine

[Tbs77]

Wasn't it a three website approach in the 90's?

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G930A using Tapatalk

[normadenardo]

4 hours ago, richietj77 said:

This is the oldest snapshot on the Internet Archive Wayback Machine site (catchy name):
https://web.archive.org/web/19970414054705/http://www.watchtower.org:80/

It could be the first year, that's the site I remember.

The links work!!  The language tab shows 7 languages. 

[On the huh]

I used this fact in a public talk and many of the brothers were surprised by it.  7 languages sounds so small compared to 900+ today.  But even at launch, the website was multi-lingual, and the number did expand very quickly.   Also the first videos appeared in 2001 on the jw-media.org site.   Ahh, the days of trying to watch pixelated videos as they start and stop to buffer.

[Brandon]

The web began around 1994-95 and we started a simple homepage not long thereafter.

 

JW-media has a snapshot as far back as 1999, and I remember in late 2007 we had a letter that we could access audio recordings of magazines on the (then new) JW.org 

 

The three sites were combined almost exactly 5 years ago now:  August/Sept 2012.

 

A few things I miss about watchtower.org was they had made a couple flash based quiz games just before the site went down, and we haven't really had any electronic interactive things like that since. Also, it showed covers of books (though not the full text) that are still printed but not available online. It would tell ppl to visit a KH to obtain such books. (ex.: Mankind's Search for God, The Bible--God's Word or Man's, etc.)

[On the huh]

I would like to see some of the videos from jw-media re-released on jw.org.  I have since obtained the downloads, but the quality is not as good.

[Brandon]

15 hours ago, Jonathan77 said:

some of the videos from jw-media …   I have since obtained the downloads, but the quality is not as good.

I have a big stash of those as well. tbh even the originals might have been of poor quality. Video often wasn't even record as 720p or HD back then.

[surfergirl]

Wow I never knew there was a website originally. Used the CD roms. But that was it. Guess we didnt have internet til 18yrs ago. 

[Sheep]

On 7/28/2017 at 10:05 PM, Tbs77 said:

Wasn't it a three website approach in the 90's?

Originally, no. There was only one official web site: watchtower.org. That's what it said in the KM at one point, to warn that there were other web sites that were about JWs. Gradually, jw-media.org (for journalists) and jw.org (with downloads of publications) were put up, but I don't recall the dates. By the time the new jw.org went online (I don't remember the date), there had been three official web sites of Jehovah's Witnesses.

 

Interestingly, even though the current jw.org started out as the only official web site, there eventually came Watchtower Online Library and JW Broadcasting. Maybe we're about time to create another "new" web site?

[Qapla]

3 minutes ago, Sheep said:

Interestingly, even though the current jw.org started out as the only official web site, there eventually came Watchtower Online Library and JW Broadcasting. Maybe we're about time to create another "new" web site?

 

It should be noted that WOL and JWB are still part of jw.org ..... the links are wol.jw.org and tv.jw.org

 

It is also of note that these additional sites did not come about until the Branch had their own server farm at one of their own facilities - prior to that, the site was hosted elsewhere and resources were limited.

[EccentricM]

On 29/07/2017 at 5:04 AM, normaclutter said:

7 languages. 

And look at where we are now! 900! 

[Brandon]

 

On August 1, 2017 at 6:08 PM, Sheep said:

Maybe we're about time to create another "new" web site?

 

On August 1, 2017 at 6:19 PM, Qapla said:

 

It should be noted that WOL and JWB are still part of jw.org ..... the links are wol.jw.org and tv.jw.org

Qapla is correct; these are called subdomain names.

 

JW.org is the domain (the "main web" space) for each of these, therefore they are technically all one "site" (one domain).

 

And to date I count at least 4 subdomains, besides the two already mentioned:

apps.jw.org - donations, login, and convention/meeting search (I'm thinking this will be expanded into more areas in the future)

stream.jw.org - originally used only for special occasions, now all elders can access and invite publishers to it who need viewing access

 

Oh and I think there's a fifth I've seen for the builders' assist or LDC but I forget what the subdomain is.

Edited August 3, 2017 by Brandon