Some interesting facts about Internet advertising

The first formal advertising on the Internet happened in October 1994 on Hotwired, when AT&T launched a banner campaign on the site. Actually, there were 14 clients of the first Internet advertising program offered by Hotwired – MCI, Sprint, Volvo and others joined AT&T in using the online platform for campaigns. This is reportedly the first banner ad that was run (by AT&T). It might be clumsy, but it did turn out to be accurate – people clicked.

First commercial spam. The first commercial spam e-mail message was sent over the Internet in April 1994 by Laurence Canter and Martha Siegel Legal Services. The spam was advertising a Green Card lottery (the couple that ran the firm were immigration lawyers) and was titled “Green Card Lottery- Final One?”