The Great Geek Manual

1596
David Fabricius discovers the first variable star, Mira, when he observes the variations in the star’s light.

1897
Thomas Edison patents the Kinetoscope, the world’s first movie camera.

1903
The New York World newspaper runs an article about Thomas Edison’s opinions on Radium and X-rays that begins on the front page. The article is entitled, “Edison Fears Hidden Perils of the X-rays.” In the article, Edison describes the injuries his laboratory employee, Clarence Dally, incurred during his research into Radium. Dally had an arm and hand amputated to remove the cancer caused by exposure to X-rays. Edison also felt that viewing the element with his own X-ray fluoroscope had harmed his eyesight two years earlier. When the focus of his left eye was disturbed he abandoned research on X-rays. Edison is quoted as saying, “I am afraid of radium and polonium too, and I don’t want to monkey with them.” Edison goes on to say, “I have had several pieces of it from Mme. Curie in Paris, and I have experimented with it. I do not see its commercial utility, but it opens up a great field of thought and scientific research. It overturns all the old theories of force and energy… I have a peculiar theory about radium, and I believe it is the correct one. I believe that there is some mysterious ray pervading the universe that is fluorescing to it. In other words, that all its energy is not self-constructed but that there is a mysterious something in the atmosphere that scientists have not found that is drawing out those infinitesimal atoms and distributing them forcefully and indestructibly.”

1908
A nearly complete, buried, skeleton of a Neanderthal is discovered in a cave at La Chapelle-aux-Saints, France. It will be examined by Marcellin Boule, who will overlook its arthritic condition and published a description that characterized the Neanderthal as a shuffling, bent-kneed, and hairy creature capable only of “rudimentary intellectual abilities.” The description will become a stereotype, until it is corrected in the fifties. The species is named after the Neander Valley in Germany, where the earliest discovery of the species was made in August 1856.

1958
The nuclear submarine USS Nautilus, becomes the first submarine to travel beneath the Arctic ice cap to the North Pole. The Nautilus is the first atomic-powered submarine in the United States Navy. Attempts earlier in the year failed due to the ice-pack conditions. The crew will create a post office while underneath the North Pole and use a home-made North Pole Stamp canceled their letters. The Post Master General will later declare it to be a legal post office.

1960
Bell Laboratories scientists conduct a coast-to-coast telephone conversation by “bouncing” their voices off the Moon.

1977
At the Warwick Hotel in New York City, Lewis Kornfeld, president of Radio Shack, a division of Tandy Corporation, announces the TRS-80 (“Trash-80″) Model I microcomputer. The TRS-80, which is the first desktop computer, is based on the Z-80 8-bit microprocessor manufactured by Zilog, which cost Tandy less than US$150,000 to develop. It features 4KB RAM, expandable to 16K RAM, a 4KB ROM, expandable to 12K ROM, a 53-key keyboard, a twelve inch RCA video display, a Realistic CTR-41 cassette-based data recorder, a built-in BASIC interpreter, BlackJack, and Backgammon. The computer uses the TRSDOS and CP/M operating systems. Several other programs are available for the system, including: the 12 Employees payroll application (US$19.95), the Math I educational application (US$19.95), and the Personal Finance finance application (US$14.95). Over ten thousand orders will be taken for the system within the first month of its release. Price: US$599.95 (Full System), US$399.95 (Microcomputer), US$199.95 (Monitor), US$49.95 (Cassette Drive)

1993
Apple Computer releases the Newton MessagePad, featuring built-in “intelligence” for managing routine tasks, at the MacWorld Expo in Boston. The system would ultimately prove unpopular, largely due to the short lifespan of its batteries and the lengthy adjustment time required by the system to adapt its handwriting recognition to a new user.

The Fear and Loathing BBS of Birmingham, Alabama is raided by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) for pirating Novell and Quarterdeck products.

1996
Apple Computer discontinues production of the PowerBook 5300 line of laptop just short of one year after it’s release on August 25, 1995. The PowerBook 5300 featured a PowerPC 603e processor and 8MB (expandable to 64MB) DRAM. Price: US$2,300 – US$6,800

1998
Apple Computer begins accepting orders for the new iMac that will hit shelves Saturday, August 15.

The website of Polygenesis is hacked by “JiG-SaW”. View an archived version of the defaced website.

1999
Yahoo! launches the Yahoo! Briefcase online file storage services.

2000
The European Union (EU) opens an antitrust case against Microsoft for allegedly abusing its market position in computer operating systems software, after Sun Microsystems filed a complaint in 1998 with the European Commission alleging that “Microsoft breached EU antitrust rules by engaging in discriminatory licensing and by refusing to supply essential information on its Windows operating system.”

2001
GameStop begins accepting pre-orders for bundled versions of Microsoft’s Xbox game system at prices ranging from US$599.91 to US$1,199.78.

The PCI-SIG group votes unanimously to adopt Intel’s proposed 3GIO or “Arapahoe” specification to replace the PCI system bus in personal computers. The technology is expected to be six times faster than the current version of PCI. The specification will be adopted as “PCI 3.0″ in 2002, with the earliest computers available by mid-2003, and industry-wide adoption projected for 2004.

2004
Roc publishes the fantasy novel Blood Rites by Jim Butcher is released in paperback. (ISBN 0-4514-5987-3) The book is the sixth in the The Dresden Files series. Visit Jim Butcher’s official website.

Tataye releases version 2.07 of the Beast Trojan, a windows based backdoor trojan horse, as freeware.

2005
The Department of Justice (DOJ) and Federal Communications Commission (FCC) officially approve the proposed merger of Nextel and Sprint into Sprint Nextel. Visit the official Sprint Nextel website.

The Mozilla Corporation is established to handle the revenue-related operations of the Mozilla Foundation. As a non-profit, the Mozilla Foundation is limited in terms of the types and amounts of revenue. Upon its creation, the Mozilla Corporation took over several areas from the Mozilla Foundation, including coordination and integration of the development of Firefox and Thunderbird and the management of relationships with businesses.

NASA astronaut Stephen Robinson fixes the thermal protection shield of the Space Shuttle Discovery in orbit, while the shuttle is docked with the International Space Station.