“In an office on the fourth floor (room 404), they placed the World Wide Web’s central database: any request for a file was routed to that office, where two or three people would manually locate the requested files and transfer them, over the network, to the person who made that request.
When the database started to grow, and the people at CERN realized that they were able to retrieve documents other than their own research-papers, not only the number of requests grew, but also the number of requests that could not be fulfilled, usually because the person who requested a file typed in the wrong name for that file. Soon these faulty requests were answered with a standard message: ‘Room 404: file not found’.” Source
“404 error page” – A common term to every internet users. But do you know from where it comes. In an office on the fourth floor (Room 404), an ambitious group of young scientists at CERN (Switzerland) located the World Wide Web’s central database. When the record of database started to increase, not only the amount of requests grew, but also increased the amount of requests that could not be fulfilled. Generally it occurs, because of requested a file in the incorrect name. Soon these error requests were replied with a regular message: “Room 404: file not found”. From where we get our today’s “404 error page”.
But today the error message is not bounded within a simple message, now this message comes with various visual presentations. Here you can see some great examples of this “404 error page” done by great designers. Source
