Airliners.net
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Screenshot
Airliners.net homepage
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Type of site
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Aircraft photo database, aviation forum |
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| Owner | Demand Media |
| Created by | Johan Lundgren, Jr. |
| Revenue | Advertising |
| Website | www |
| Alexa rank |
 10,734 as of January 2017
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| Commercial | Yes |
| Launched | May 23, 1997 |
| Current status | Active |
Airliners.net is an aviation website that includes an extensive photo database of aircraft and airports, as well as a forum catering to aviation enthusiasts. Created by Johan Lundgren, Jr., the site originated in 1996 as Pictures of Modern Airliners. It was handed over to Demand Media in 2007 and underwent a major redesign in 2016.
Johan Lundgren, Jr., an IT student and aviation enthusiast attending Luleå University of Technology in Sweden, created the site Pictures of Modern Airliners in 1996. Lundgren had been working on the site during his military service. It initially hosted only his own aircraft photos before a new section was created for other photographers to upload their photos.
In 1997, Lundgren transitioned to a new site entitled Airliners.net and established a web server in his dormitory room. Three more servers were added, and eventually all servers were relocated to the computer rooms at the university. Lundgren started investing all of his time into the site, although he received help from a growing number of volunteers.
On 27 July 2007, Lundgren announced the site would be acquired by Demand Media. It was sold to the company for USD $8.2 million. Reasons behind the decision included the difficulty of managing the rapidly growing site, which was by that point supported by 25 servers.
As you probably know, Airliners.net keeps growing year after year with more photos, more forum posts, more visitors, more users and more photographers. This is fantastic. I could never in my wildest dreams have imagined this success when I started the site ten years ago.
And what comes with success?? Managing it. And I know you have felt some of the growing pains. There are infrastructure issues – like trying to stay on top of the hardware needs of this site but complexities and the site’s growth have caused outages. What started in my dorm room on one computer is now supported by 25 – and that’s not including all the network gear.
A revamped site was launched on 14 June 2016.
The site offers free membership, using online advertising instead as a source of revenue. Before the June 2016 redesign, Airliners.net provided three levels of membership: the Photographer Account, Premium Membership and First Class Membership. The latter two required payment while a Photographer Account could be created for free.
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