1988
Covidea announces it will discontinue its videotex services, Business Banking and Pronto.
1990
Amid a wealth of rumors, Leslie Schmick resigns from Atari Corp. In 1991, Schmick will file a lawsuit against Atari and Gregory Pratt alleging that she was coerced by Pratt into a sexual relationship in order to keep her position.
1991
Paramount Pictures releases the science fiction film Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, directed by Nicholas Meyer and starring William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, DeForest Kelley, James Doohan, George Takei, Walter Koenig, and Nichelle Nichols, to 1,804 U.S. theaters. In it, the crews of the Enterprise and the Excelsior must stop a plot to prevent a peace treaty between the Klingon Empire and the Federation. Produced on a budget of US$30 million, it will gross US$18,162,837 domestically in its opening weekend. IMDB listing (MPAA Rating: PG) Running Time: 1 hr 53 mins
1992
Version 2.1 of the Pretty Good Privacy (PGP) cryptographic application is released.
1995
Adobe and International Business Machines (IBM) announce a licensing agreement with Sun Microsystems for the use of Java.
Microsoft agrees to pay royalties to Spyglass of close to US$1 per web browser shipped for the Windows 3.1, after nearly a year of shipping the browser royalty-free.
Microsoft and Sun Microsystems agree on terms under which Microsoft will license Java for its web browser software near midnight.
Sony announces that sales of the PlayStation video game system in the U.S. have reached 300,000 units to date. Only 130,000 units of the competing Sega Saturn video game system have been sold in the U.S.
1996
The website of the British Labour Party is hacked anonymously. View an archived version of the defaced website.
1997
Five commercial websites are hacked by “KAOS 97″. View archived versions of the websites.
1998
At approximately 9:07pm EST, astronauts on the U.S. Space Shuttle Endeavour complete the most difficult task of their twelve day mission, maneuvering modules from Russia and the United States to join the first two building blocks of International Space Station.
In an published in Reuters, entitled “Internet Capacity Major Theme For 1999 Study,” Frances Hong reports that “… traffic over the Internet is doubling every 100 days.”
1999
AT&T agrees in principle to give competing Internet providers access to its high-speed cable lines.
Avid Technology releases version 7.55 of its Avid Matador graphics application for Silicon Graphics workstations. Matador is intended for creating animation and rotoscoping for films. Price: US$10,000
2000
Hasbro announces plans to sell their Hasbro Interactive and Game.com divisions to France-based Infogrames Entertainment SA for US$5 million cash and US$95 million in stock. The company also plan to reduce its staff by 750 people. Hasbro Interactive wholly owns Atari’s home console patents and intellectual rights.
Shares of Apple Computer fall to their lowest price in two years following the company’s announcement that slow holiday sales will contribute to its first quarterly operating loss in three years a day earlier.
Version 5 of the Opera internet suite is released. It is the first version supported by ads rather than a trial period and a purchasable full version. Visit the application’s official website.
2001
Yahoo! launches Yahoo! Finance Money Manager.
2003
Version 1.3 of the CRUX operating system is released. Crux is designed to be a lightweight, i686-optimized Linux distribution for experienced Linux users. Visit the system’s official website.
2004
The final assets of Acclaim Entertainment go up for auction. The filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy on September 1, 2004 and was subsequently forced to liquidate its assets to pay off debts in excess of US$100 million.
2005
Apple Computer announces that iTunes Music Store customers have downloaded three million videos since the launch of the service’s video support on October 12, 2005. Visit the official iTunes Store website.
2006
The DC Comics series Batman Confidential debuts. The series centers on the earlier career of Batman, in the first weeks after he became a crimefighter. The series’ stories center on pivotal moments in the character’s development, as the introduction of his supporting cast, first encounters with villains, and early personal issues that shape him into the well-known character portrayed in other series.
The Institute of Cancer Epidemiology in Denmark reports that it hasn’t uncovered any statistically significant correlation between cancer and cell phone use in a study based on about four hundred thousand cell phone users.
Microsoft launches a beta version of its Live Search Books service.
NASA releases photographs taken by the Mars Global Surveyor that suggest the presence of liquid water on the planet Mars in two craters.
Version 1.5.2 of the BioPerl programming language is released. BioPerl is a collection of Perl modules for the development of bioinformatics applications. Visit the language’s official website.
2007
IBM announces a breakthrough in converting electrical signals into light pulses. Researchers hope that the advance will one day allow individual processors to perform tasks that now require supercomputers.
2009
Iranian authorities slow internet connections to a crawl or shut them down completely nation-wide in anticipation of student protests the following day in an attempt to prevent communication between event organizers. Authorities also order foreign journalists not to leave their offices to cover the demonstrations.
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