PlanetAll [SEP] inception
PlanetAll
PlanetAll was a social networking, calendaring, and address book site launched in November 1996. It was founded by a group of Harvard Business School and MIT graduates including Warren Adams and Brian Robertson. Their company, Sage Enterprises, was based in Cambridge, Massachusetts and was the winner of the 1996 New Business of the Year Award from the Cambridge Chamber of Commerce.
Background.
PlanetAll was possibly the first social networking site on the Internet. The site had more than 100,000 groups, organized around real-world
; the site would then notify users when they would cross paths with their contacts.
On August 4, 1998, Amazon.com announced that it had agreed to acquire PlanetAll. Under terms of the agreement, Amazon.com acquired 100 percent of PlanetAll in exchange for 800,000 shares. Amazon.com founder and CEO Jeff Bezos said, "PlanetAll is the most innovative use of the Internet I've seen. It's simply a breakthrough in doing something as fundamental and important as staying in touch. The reason PlanetAll has over 1.5 million members—and