Graph: Codes and Revisions By Year

History

Based on available data, we can separate signature code usage into a few time periods:

1984 to 1994: Introduction / “first wave”

Bear Code debuts on soc.motss. Several codes, including Geek Code, are introduced in 1993.

Home computers and internet connections become more common, but personal home pages and blogs are still very rare: Internet users at this time share information mostly through bulletin board systems, email, and USENET. Early internet communities and cultures begin to form, necessitating introductions and reintroductions and inviting in-group markers like webrings and signature codes.

1995 to 2004: Heyday / “second wave”

Geek Code is covered in the Washington Post, and the number of signature codes and revisions increases abruptly from 1995 through 2002.

Home computers become much more common, and in the U.S., broadband internet connections start to become available. Personal home pages become more available through ISPs, universities, and through nascent hosting services like GeoCities (1994), Tripod (1995), and Angelfire (1996).

“Web 2.0”, a term introduced in 1999, becomes popular in 2004 to represent the growing number of services that allow ordinary users to post content in their own blogs and websites.

2005 to 2018: Lull

Fewer lasting codes are created, as it becomes easier for users to represent themselves on their own blogs and on social media services such as MySpace and Facebook. High-speed internet and large-capacity email services become endemic, and the web pivots toward messaging services like Snapchat, photo and video sharing services like Flickr and YouTube, and microblogs such as Tumblr and Twitter.

2019 to present: Resurgence / “third wave”

Signature codes make a small but noticeable resurgence approximately 25 years after the original 1995-2004 fad, particularly among users eager to define themselves on post-Twitter blogging sites, nostalgic “old internet” sites like NeoCities, and for an increasing breadth of sexual, gender, and alterhuman identities.

Caveats

The above is somewhat anecdotal in nature, and is subject to survivor bias: not all codes created are visible or recoverable in 2025, particularly those created on private mailing lists and forums managed across 2000-2020. Code revisions without available dates may have their dates inferred based on the same logic as the timeline. Codes with many dated revisions may be overrepresented above.