The Great Geek Manual

1809
The first patent issued in the U.S. for a metallic writing pen is issued to Peregrine Williamson, a Baltimore jeweler. The pens are made of steel rolled from wire to for a steel quill that never needs its nib to be sharpened. A few steel pens have already been in use in Britain.

1899
The Marconi Wireless Company of America is incorporated in New Jersey.

1904
The first direct current, electric motor to be patented in the U.S. is issued to Mathias Pfatischer of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. (US No.775,310) The “Variable Speed Motor” is designed to “effect commutation without sparking, with a variable load as well as at variable speed and which is capable of rotation in either direction.”
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As the Internet gains in importance and penetrates more and more walks of public life, Western governments are poised to feel—and many of them are already feeling—growing pressure to regulate it. Some of that pressure will inevitably have illegitimate, harmful, and undemocratic origins; much of it won’t. The way forward is to acknowledge that the public pressure to regulate the Web is growing and that not all of the ensuing regulation should be resisted because the Internet is the sacred cow of the libertarian movement. The only way to get it right is to avoid holding on to some abstract absolute truths—for example, that the Internet is a revolutionary force that should be spared any regulation whatsoever—but rather to invest one’s energy into seeking broad public agreement on what acceptable, transparent, just, and democratic procedures by which such regulation is to occur should look like.

- The Net Delusion: The Dark Side of Internet Freedom by Evgeny Morozov, 2011.

1877
Thomas Edison announces the invention of his “talking machine,” which he will later dub the phonograph. The device can record and play sound using a tin-foil cylinder. He will receive a patent for the invention on February 19, 1878.

1905
Albert Einstein publishes his paper, “Does the Inertia of a Body Depend Upon Its Energy Content?,” in the journal “Annalen der Physik.” This paper reveals the relationship between energy and mass and leads to the mass-energy equivalence formula E = MC².
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Technology, however, shapes the structure of the battle, but not every outcome. While the printing press was without doubt the foundation of modern democracy, the response to the flood of publishing that it brought forth has been censorship as often as press freedom. In some times and places the even more capacious new media will open wider the floodgates for discourse, but in other times and places, in fear of that flood, attemptts will be made to shut the gates. The easy access, low cost, and distributed intelligence of modern means of communication are a prime reason for hope. The democratic impulse to regulate evils, as Tocqueville warned, is ironically a reason for worry.

- Technologies of Freedome by Ithiel de Sola Pool, 1983.

Book: Mercury Rises
ISBN-13: 978-1612180861

Author: Robert Kroese
Series: Mercury Trilogy
Publisher: AmazonEncore
Genre: Sci-Fi / Comedy
Release: October 18, 2011
Length: 275 pages (Paperback)

Book Rating: B- (80 / 100)
Series Rating: B (85 / 100)

Verdict

Mercury Rises, like its predecessor, is a fast-paced, absurd story about an unlikely hero on a quest to save the world that plays out like an Adam Douglas re-write of Kevin Smith’s Dogma. The result is a light-hearted, pop-culture-studded romp that’s recommended escapism for any geek or urban fantasy fan looking for a good laugh. Unfortunately, as the second book in a trilogy, Mercury Rises features a somewhat unsatisfying ending that leaves the book feeling like a transitional piece.

Pros: Fast-paced. Hilarious. Witty dialogue.

Cons: A little over the top. A little long. Somewhat disappointing ending.

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1906
Electrical engineer Greenleaf Whittier Pickard receives a patent for the crystal detector, one of the first devices widely used for receiving radio broadcasts, until the later development of the later triode vacuum tube. His patent describes the device as “a means for receiving intelligence communicated by electric waves.”

1920
KDKA becomes the first radio station credited with broadcasting regularly scheduled professional programming.

1931
The first commercial teletype service is introduced by American Telephone and Telegraph Company (AT&T).
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If there is an overarching theme to modern technology it is that it defies the expectations of its creators, taking on functions and roles that were never intended at creation.

- The Net Delusion: The Dark Side of Internet Freedom by Evgeny Morozov, January 4, 2011.

[...] technology leads a double life, one which conforms to the intentions of designers and interests of power and another which contradicts them—proceeding behind the backs of their architects to yield unintended consequences and unintended possibilities. Similarly, for all the deliberate care and preliminary planning that goes into them, technologies rarely fulfill all evaluation criteria…

- Forces of production by David F. Noble, 1984.