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According to Ellison and Boyd (2007), the first start of social networking began with the website SixDegrees.com in 1997 which had a format to create a user profile and then create friend lists that could be viewed by others. This website was linked to popular instant messaging programs such as AOL Instant Messenger (AIM) in order to include other forms of contact to friends within the social network (p. 214). SixDegrees.com was the very first website that met the modern definition of a social website. There were other websites out there such as classmates.com and other dating websites that had social networking themes, but SixDegrees.com was the first to incorporate much more than a singular need such as dating or classmate finding. SixDegrees.com was shut down in 2000 due to lack of popularity. The main reason for the decline of SixDegrees.com was the fact internet access was still in its infancy in terms of the average number of users who had an internet connection at home (A. Weinreich, personal communication, July 11, 2007). The internet bubble was building however and as internet infrastructure grew so did the new technologies in social networking. In 2003 the first significant mainstream success was the website Myspace.com (Ellison & Boyd 216). It was built in order to compete with existing social networking websites, incorporating many popular existing social networking features as well as many new aspects. From then on, the new social networking age had officially launched based on the popularity of myspace.com and the expansion of cheaper broadband internet into even more homes globally.