A history of social networking before Facebook and Twitter

Online Schools has compiled a fun infographic chronicling the history of social networking on the Web, from the first email to Facebook.

There’s nothing like a good infographic to teach us something too boring for simple text. This lengthy graphic chronicles the “history of social networking,” from the very first email sent in 1971 to several of the social networking sites that dominate the Web today. Along the way we meet several ill-fated sites and services like Usenet, Geocities, TheGlobe, SixDegrees, and Friendster. Did you know that the first version of MySpace was written in 10 days and created by an Internet Marketing Firm? Check it out.

Of course, the graph at the bottom leaves out a number of top social networks like LinkedIn and Orkut, but Online Schools probably didn’t create the graph to be thorough.