LONDON, 2016: It’s our birthday. And we’re celebrating! This year we’re 17 years old – so we’re emerging from our adolescence and marching proudly into adulthood.
What have the last 17 years held for us? We’ve witnessed many changes in the world. To celebrate and recognise these changes, we let our copywriter loose a bit (as it’s our birthday) and he came up with a list of things that have happened since 1999:
- We’ve had 10 versions of Microsoft Windows. Remember Windows ME? Yeah, we remember that one too! Since then we’ve had Windows XP, Windows 7, Windows 8 and many more.
- Manchester United have won the Premier League 9 times since 1999, under the tutelage of Sir Alex Ferguson. And remember some of the legends they’ve had? Cristiano Ronaldo, Ruud van Nistelrooy and…Fabian Barthez. (And our copywriter isn’t a United fan!)
- Social Media was born in the last 17 years. Arguably the biggest – Facebook went live in 2005 when the now world famous, Mark Zuckerberg decided to start coding “Facemash” at Harvard University. It became a cultural phenomenon and rapidly spread across the entire globe. Other social networks followed Twitter (2006), Instagram (2010).
- Apple revolutionised the telecoms industry with the iPhone launch in 2007. Experts widely agree that even though smartphones were released before the iPhone, it wasn’t until Steve Jobs and Apple released their famous phone that the world started to take notice.
- Andy Murray ended Britain’s long wait for a men’s Wimbledon champion; with his two titles in 2013 and 2016. The last British man to have won Wimbledon was Fred Perry all the way back in 1936. Not to blow Andy’s trumpet too much, but he’s also double gold medallist in the Olympics!
- Y2K. Hysteria gripped the world in 1999. Called the Millennium Bug on these shores, it was widely prophesied as the death knell for electronics and IT. Related to the representation of the year within computer systems, it basically caused computers issues because they couldn’t differentiate between 1900 and 2000. A couple of software patches later and we were all bringing in the year 2000 with a glass of wine and some leftover Christmas dinner! What was the fuss about again?
- Remember these? We were watching these films in 1999: Toy Story 2, The Iron Giant and Being John Malkovich and The Blair Witch Project.
- Perhaps most embarrassingly we were listening to these: …Baby one more time, Livin’ La Vida Loca and Blue (Da Ba Dee).
- And number 9! It just also happens to be the number of times Advantage has moved office since 1999! We’ve recently moved into our new home at Lombard Street, where we’re planning to stay a good few years yet.
A couple more things before you go. This is what our website looked like all the way back in 2002:
Cosmetically, we’ve been through changes on our website. And these will continue to happen. But what won’t change is our dedication to delivering high quality customer service and our passion for Microsoft Dynamics.
We’ll keep earning accreditation’s like these. And we’ll keep delivering the highest level of service we possibly can.
We want to thank every single one of you that’s gave us your custom over the last 17 years.
So please – Raise a glass, to the last 17 years of Advantage. And for 17 years more!
*Hear, hear!*
