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Which came first, Facebook or the Macintosh?

Which came first, Facebook or the Macintosh?
the Macintosh
1984 — 20 years before Facebook

the Macintosh came first, by 20 years. Apple launched the first Macintosh, two days after the Super Bowl advert.

Side by side

Facebook the Macintosh
Year 2004 1984
Date 2004-02-04 1984-01-24
Category technology technology
What happened TheFacebook launched for Harvard students only. Apple launched the first Macintosh, two days after the Super Bowl advert.

Facebook

Facebook launched on 4 February 2004 restricted to Harvard email addresses, opened to other universities through 2004 and 2005, and to anyone over 13 with an email address in September 2006. It is six years younger than Google and a year older than YouTube. Its predecessor Facemash, which compared students' photographs, was shut down by the university within days in 2003.

the Macintosh

The Macintosh launched in January 1984 with a graphical interface and a mouse, and beat Windows to market by almost two years. Neither invented the idea — Xerox PARC had built the Alto in 1973, and both Apple and Microsoft were working from what they had seen there. Mac OS X, the ancestor of today's macOS, arrived much later in 2001 and is Unix underneath.

Common questions

Which came first, Facebook or the Macintosh?
the Macintosh, by 20 years — 1984 against 2004.
When did Facebook start?
2004. TheFacebook launched for Harvard students only.
When did the Macintosh start?
1984. Apple launched the first Macintosh, two days after the Super Bowl advert.

Related pages

Sources

  1. Wikidata — Wikimedia Foundation (CC0 1.0)

How these figures are compiled and checked