1922
All thirteen million telephones in North America go silent for the space of one minute at sunset during the funeral services of Alexander Graham Bell. Bell is buried in a coffin built by his lab staff in a tomb carved into the solid rock of Beinn Bhreagh Mountain on his estate in Nova Scotia, Canada. To commemorate his pioneering contributions to telecommunications technology, AT&T and the Bell System suspends service at their switchboards and switching stations across Canada and the United States. Bell passed away on August 2, 1922.
1971
The US launches a satellite into lunar orbit from a manned spacecraft for the first time.
1987
International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) introduces the PS/2 Model 25, with an 8MHz Intel 8086 CPU, a combined system unit complete with monitor, dual floppy drives (no hard drive), and reduced-size keyboard. Price: US$1,350
1988
The first shuttle mission since the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster is delayed when a computer cancels the ignition of the Space Shuttle Discovery during an engine test after determining that a valve was failing to close fast enough. Both the test and the computer system were instituted since the Challenger’s launch to ensure the mission’s safety.
1989
Konami releases the turn-based strategy game Cosmic Wars for the Famicom in Japan.
1995
Hackers crack the NY Times Internet service and crash it.
Paramount Pictures releases the sci-fi film Virtuosity, directed by Brett Leonard and starring Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe, to 2,012 US theaters. In the film, a virtual serial killer, SID 6.7, escapes from the virtual world when he’s transferred into an android body and a reinstated police officer must race to put an end to SID’s killing spree. Produced a budget of US$30 million, the film will gross US$8,309,869 domestically in its opening weekend. IMDB listing MPAA Rating: R Running Time: 1 hr 45 mins
1997
Motorola and International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) introduce the PowerPC 740 and 750 processors, available in 233 and 266MHz speeds. Price: US$550-570 in 1000-unit quantities
1999
Nuance Communications releases version 4.0 of the Dragon NaturallySpeaking speech recognition software package for Windows in several editions, including: Essentials,Standard, Preferred, Professional, Legal, Medical, and Mobile.
2000
America Online, Inc.’s (AOL) Netscape Communications announces plans to remove a SmartDownload product feature that passes information about the downloads to Netscape without the user’s knowledge. The change comes following a class-action lawsuit filed by a New Jersey photographer in July seeking a minimum of US$10,000 in damages per person.
The Brazilian website of Brasoftware Informatica Ltda is hacked by “TankDS”. The website is hosted on a server running Windows NT. View an archived version of the defaced website.
The first version of TortoiseCVS a CVS tool for Microsoft Windows released under the General Public License (GNU). Visit the application’s official website.
An unidentified sixteen year old Montreal, Canada-area hacker named Mike Calce (also known by the handle “Mafiaboy“) pleads not guilty to criminal mischief charges related to denial-of-service attacks against (), CNN and eBay, and Yahoo!, in February. Meanwhile, the prosecution levies an additional sixty-four new charges against him based on evidence discovered by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police linking him to substantial attacks on five other websites.
The Stargate SG-1 episode “Window of Opportunity” first airs. (No. 406) In it, O’Neill and Teal’c get trapped in a time loop that only they know about after an encounter with an Ancient time device. GateWorld entry
Sun Microsystems, Inc. reveals plans to create approximately 275 new engineering jobs over the next three years to double its size in the software development center located in Dublin, Ireland.
2001
A complete re-write of the Code Red worm, Code Red II, begins spreading across the Internet. China is especially hard hit. The worm is designed to exploit a security hole in the indexing software included as part of Microsoft’s Internet Information Server (IIS) web server software. Read an analysis of Code Red II.
Wyoming Governor Jim Geringer urges the United States Congress to permit his state and others to institute taxes on e-commerce, which under a bill passed by former president Bill Clinton, are under a moratorium.
2002
eMule is first released as a binary as version 0.05a. Hendrik Breitkreuz (also known by the handle “Merkur”) began developing the eMule project on May 13, 2002 after becoming dissatisfied with the original eDonkey2000 client. The source was first released as version 0.02 and published on SourceForge on July 6, 2002.
2003
Germany’s Berlin-Brandenburg region completes the conversion from analogue to digital terrestrial television and becomes the first location in the world to switch off all analogue television transmitters.
Version 1.8 of the Ruby programming language is released. Visit the official Ruby website.
2004
Nokia releases Bomberman for the N-Gage in the US.
2005
Agetec releases the third-person shooter Armored Core: Last Raven for the PlayStation 2 in Japan.
Nintendo releases the role-playing game Pokémon XD: Gale of Darkness for the GameCube in Japan.
Square Enix releases Grandia III for the PlayStation 2 in Japan.
2006
AOL Research releases a compressed text file containing twenty million search keywords for over 650,000 users over a three month period for research purposes. While none of the records on the file are personally identifiable, certain keywords contain personally identifiable information, such as users who searched for their own name, address, or social security number. Although the searchers are only identified by a numeric ID, the New York Times will successfully discover the identity of several searchers, and with her permission, exposed search number 4417749 as Thelma Arnold, a sixty-two year old Georgian widow. This breach in privacy will lead to the resignation of AOL’s chief technical officer (CTO), Maureen Govern on August 21, 2006 along with the researcher who released the data and his immediate supervisor, who reported to Govern. AOL will pull the records on August 7th, acknowledging that it was a mistake to release it, but the files have been mirrored on websites across the Internet.
Capcom releases the survival horror game Dead Rising for the Xbox 360 in North America. Visit the game’s official website. ESRB: M (Mature)
Linux Game Publishing releases the stealth action game Cold War for Linux. The game bears a strong resemblance to the Splinter Cell game series in that it uses a stealth-action system. ESRB: T (Teen) USK: 16
Sony Computer Entertainment adds the third person shooter SOCOM 3: U.S. Navy SEALs to the list of Sony Greatest Hits. ESRB: M (Mature)
Sony Computer Entertainment releases the survival horror game Siren 2 for the PlayStation 2 in Europe. The game follows several characters who become trapped on Yamijima Island after a blood-red tsunami which capsizes a ferry loaded with passengers. CERO: 15+ OFLC: MA15+ PEGI: 16+ USK: 16+
The Stargate: Atlantis episode “Sateda” first airs. (No. 1004) In it, the Ronon is handed over to the Wraith, who return him to his homeworld where he is once again forced to become the prey in their hunt. GateWorld entry
THQ releases Monster House for the GameCube and PlayStation 2 in Europe. The game is based on the animated movie of the same name. PEGI: 7+
2007
NASA launches the robotic Mars Phoenix lander aboard a Delta II rocket on a mission to explore the northern hemisphere of Mars in a search for microbial life.
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