Douglas Hofstadter and Jeff Bezos

Jeff Bezos: Key product The complete Star Trek: The Next Generation. But see next year for the company first sale. 1995: Amazon.com goes live, according to The Guardian. Key product Douglas Hofstadter Fluid Concepts and Creative Analogies : Computer Models of the Fundamental Mechanisms of Thought, the first book ever sold on the site. 1996: Send us your freaks American entrepreneur Jeff Bezos first registers his fledgling company under the name Cadabra Inc in July 1994. But troubles with the name not least that people mishear it as "Cadaver" prompt a change. Bezos, a Star Trek fan, also considers calling the company MakeItSo.com, after Captain Picard catchphrase in Star Trek: The Next Generation, and holds a party for the show final episode in May 1994. On 1 November, however, he registers Amazon because it begins with A, sounds exotic and, he mistakenly believes, is the longest river in the world the Nile is actually more than 400km longer . On 16 July 1995, the world gets its first glimpse of Amazon.com. Early orders tend to be for esoteric titles that are hard to locate in mainstream bookstores, while overseas orders particularly from US military personnel make up a large proportion of sales. The year bestseller is indicative of early customer interests How to Set Up and Maintain a World Wide Web Site: The Guide for Information Providers by Lincoln D Stein. (news.financializer.com). As reported in the news.