Correct Answer:
D. 1971
The correct answer is 1971. The first electronic mail message was sent in 1971 by American computer engineer Ray Tomlinson, who implemented a system to send messages between users on different computers across the ARPANET, the precursor to the modern Internet.
The Birth of Email in 1971
- Ray Tomlinson's Breakthrough: Working at BBN Technologies, Tomlinson modified the existing file‑transfer protocol to append a message to a mailbox file on a remote machine. He used the @ symbol to separate the user name from the host machine name, a convention that remains universal.
- The First Message: The content of the first email was a test string—reportedly "something like QWERTYUIOP"—and it was sent between two computers sitting side‑by‑side, connected via ARPANET.
- Why Not the Other Years?:
- 1965: MIT's Compatible Time‑Sharing System (CTSS) allowed users to leave messages for others on the *same* computer, but this was not network email.
- 1969: The ARPANET was launched, but networked person‑to‑person email had not yet been invented.
- 1983: By this time, email was already widespread and standard protocols like SMTP were being formalized.
- Impact: Tomlinson's innovation is the foundation of modern digital communication, from personal messaging to global business correspondence.
Therefore, the first email was sent in 1971.