1576
The cornerstone for the Uraniborg observatory of Tycho Brahe is laid on Hven an island in the Ö resund, between Zealand and Scania.
1876
Thomas Edison receives a patent for his mimeograph, which he describes as a “method of preparing autographic stencils for printing.”
1911
The millionth patent is filed at the United States Patent Office by Francis Holton for a tubeless vehicle tire.
1955
The Geneva conference is held to discuss peaceful uses of atomic energy.
1980
The Project Chess task force at International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) shows a prototype microcomputer to the Corporate Management Committee, featuring 32KB ROM, 16KB RAM (expandable to 256KB), six expansion slots, a color/mono display, an eight-inch floppy disk drive, an optional floating-point processor, a joystick port, and a printer port. The committee gives its approval build an operational microcomputer. They are given a deadline of one year to bring the new computer to market. Code-name: Acorn
1989
Microsoft introduces its most successful office product, Microsoft Office. Unlike the model of Microsoft Works, Microsoft Office is a bundle of separate office productivity applications, such as Microsoft Word and Microsoft Excel. rather than a single application.
The Space Shuttle Columbia takes off on a secret five-day military mission. (STS-28)
1991
The Gen Con Game Fair is held at the Milwaukee Exposition & Convention Center & Arena in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Visit the event’s official website.
1995
The United States Justice Department announces it will not pursue an antitrust case against Microsoft before the launch of Windows 95.
2000
Intel announced the development of its next generation of microprocessors, the Pentium 4.
2001
The AT&T Corporation reveals that they have begun blocking access to web servers operated by residential customers in a response to the increased threats of the Code Red worm. Sarah Eder of AT&T defended the action by explaining that “customers are not permitted to operate servers behind cable modems.”
Deerfield, Illinois-based Baxter Healthcare Corporation announces that they have launched an ergonomic state-of-the-art donor “e-Chair” that enables blood donors to surf the Internet while they donate blood.
Gateway, Inc. announces its intentions to close its British and Dublin based operations, resulting in over a thousand layoffs.
The Toshiba Corporation states that it plans to cut the domestic production of Dynamic random access memory (DRAM) production by as much as sixty percent in response to weakening worldwide demand.
Version 6.1 of the Netscape Internet Suite is released.
2002
Microsoft announces that it is working on a sequel to the blockbuster game Halo for the Xbox.
2003
Daniel Baas, age 24, of Ohio is charged with hacking Arkansas-based Acxiom Corporation, a company known among privacy advocates for collecting consumer data into one of the largest such databases in the world, via FTP on December 10th 2002. Some of the company’s databases were left exposed on the Internet, while some files are stolen. Acxiom Corp. serves fourteen of the country’s fifteen largest credit card companies, seven of the top ten auto manufacturers, and five of the top six retail banks. Acxiom also analyzes consumer databases for a number of major companies and Fortune 500 firms, including: AT&T, General Electric, IBM, Microsoft, and Sears. Jennifer Barrett, Acxiom’s chief privacy officer, states that the information stolen included, “a wide variety of information, some of which was personal, some of which was not.” She will emphasize, however, that much of the data stolen was encrypted, which minimizes the risk of identity theft. The company was unaware of the hack for nearly eight months. It only learned of the incident when it was contacted by the Hamilton County sheriff’s office. Baas had been arrested on an unrelated but similar charge on August 1st by Detective Rick Sweeney of the Hamilton County Sheriff’s Regional Crime Information unit.
2004
Version 1.10 of the IM2 multiprotocal instant messaging application is released as freeware for Windows. Visit the application’s official website.
2005
Three weeks prior to the EU launch Lik Sang, a Hong Kong exporter of video games and hardware announces that it is being sued by Sony in Europe for parallel importation of the PSP.
Yahoo! announces on its Search Blog that, following a vast expansion, its search engine index encompasses 19 billion are documents, 1.5 billion images and more than 50 million audio and video files, nearly twice the 11.3 billion items Google has publicly stated its indexes.
2006
America Online (AOL) publicly apologizes for releasing a data file containing the search queries of more than 650,000 of its US subscribers ten days prior, after the release caused a media sensation and stirred privacy concerns among the ISP’s users. In its apology, it characterized the release as “a screw up” and an “innocent attempt to reach out to the academic community with research tools.”
During a QuakeCon panel, Kevin Cloud, co-owner of id Software, claims that piracy is “killing PC games.” “It’s the primary reason retailers are moving to the console,” Cloud said. Read more at 1Up.com.
Gen Con, LLC announces that it will be expanding its gaming exhibits to include video games. The company also states that it will increase venue space at its Indianapolis convention and relocate its Anaheim convention to the Los Angeles Convention Center.
Version 1.3.3 of the Java Tcl programming language is released. Java Tcl is a Java-based, open source, implementation of the Tcl scripting language. Visit the language’s official sourceforge page.
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