One of the internet's biggest names eBay celebrates its 20th anniversary today (September 3) according to Digital Spy.

Although the company now towers over the retail landscape as the world's biggest online auctioneer, it comes from humble beginnings.

A broken laser pointer was the first item ever sold on eBay.

The site originally launched as the text-heavy AuctionWeb just days after Windows 95 was released, started as a hobby project by programmer Pierre Omidyar.

It changed its name to eBay in 1997 after Omidyar's consulting group Echo Bay Technology Group discovered that the 'Echo Bay' domain name was already taken.

"eBay changed what it meant to go shopping. It showed the world how the Internet can bring together people and goods on opposite sides of the world as if they lived in the same neighbourhood," said Kevin Dallas of Worldpay eCommerce.

"In the twenty years since the company launched, hundreds of thousands of budding entrepreneurs and established retailers have set up shop online to take advantage of this for themselves."

The most expensive item ever sold on eBay during its first two decades is a $168m yacht, believed to have been snapped up by Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich.