Happy 5th Birthday Mashable (#mashbday)
Five years ago today, a young Pete Cashmore wrote his first post for Mashable.com in the bedroom of his home in Scotland.
His idea was to dive deep into the technology and social media world, covering it 24/7, 365. Really, Cashmore set out to cover "mash-ups," which, back in 2005 was the online "thing" to do.
After a humble beginning, Cashmore secured his first advertisement, and in 2006, hired his first staff writer. In 2007, the blog swelled to four million monthly pageviews.
Today, Mashable is arguably the most popular social media news site, covering the space diligently and, oftentimes, breaking news that spreads like wildfire.
Now, some of the hardcore social media geeks will talk how Mashable sold out and went "commercial," but the truth is in the pudding. The site gets a ton of eyeballs and breaks news that often gets picked up by mainstream media.
No longer are the New York Times and Wall Street Journal sitting atop the media mountain alone. Mashable is there with them, like it or not. What's amazing is that, while it took years for the Journal and the Times to reach the pinnacle of journalism, Mashable did it in just five.
The site boasts 30 million monthly pageviews, a full-time staff of 30 and hundreds of guest writers.
If you want to chat about your views on Mashable's place in the media world, you can do so by commenting over at their birthday post or via Twitter using #mashbday.
Here's a video that Cashmore did about the anniversary:
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