Growth of the Internet from 1998 to 2008 [INFOGRAPHIC]

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In 1998, the only countries with significant Internet usage were the USA, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Iceland, Netherlands, Switzerland, Denmark and Sweden. Of course, I remember using the Internet in Croatia every day back then, but it's true: For most people, it was "this new thing" and it didn't play a very important part of our everyday lives.

Moving the slider below the charts forward into future, you can see how quickly western Europe adopted the Internet, with more than 31% of people online in most European countries by 2005. In Africa, however, the numbers are dismal, even today. Check out the interactive chart over at the BBC News website.

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