The history of paid rankings

Before search was good, directories were the map of the web — and several of them sorted their listings by whoever paid the most to be near the top.

A search engine that ranked results by advertiser bid, printed the price next to each one, and became the business model that funded the modern web.

A million pixels at a dollar each, sold on one page by a student who needed tuition money. An early example of selling fixed space on a web page.

Pay more than the last monarch, take the throne, and raise the price for whoever comes next. The first pay-to-rank game where the rules were code.

Domain registration dates, reported totals and bidding rules from the 2026 Outbid Lol wave.