This Day in Geek History: February 17
1992
The Star Trek: The Next Generation episode “Conundrum” first airs. (No. 514) In it, the crew all suffer from amnesia, but they slowly come to believe that the Enterprise is to play a pivotal role in a war. Memory Alpha entry
1994
Apple Computer releases the QuickTake 100 camera. It’s the first digital camera released for the consumer-level market that connects to a personal computer via a serial cable. The camera will be discontinued January 1, 1995.
1996
Grandmaster Garry Kasparov, wins the last of six games against the IBM computer Deep Blue, a computer capable of “seeing” between fifty to one hundred billion chess positions in a mere three minute period. By winning a second game, Kasparov wins the regulation-style match held in Philadelphia, as part of the ACM Computer Science Conference. Deep Blue is an improved version of the older Deep Thought.
NASA launches its Discovery Program with the launch of the NEAR Shoemaker spacecraft on its first mission, to orbit and land on asteroid 433 Eros.
1997
Apple Computer introduces a number of updated Macintosh computers, including the PowerBook 3400 and 4400, and the Power Macintosh 7300, 8600, and 9600. Apple Computer also introduces the eMate handheld computer and the Newton MessagePad 2000, featuring a 32-bit 162MHz StrongARM processor and 5MB RAM. Visit the official website of Apple Computer.
1998
The website of Alis Technologies is hacked by “Magica de Bin”. View an archived version of the defaced website.
New World Computing releases the turn-based strategy game Chaos Overlords for personal computers in Europe.
The website of Top 50 Mp3 is hacked by “Prizm”. View an archived version of the defaced website.
1999
The website of Goddard Space Flight Center Laboratory is hacked by “Chaos Hackerz Crew”. View an archived version of the defaced website.
2000
Computers with the Windows 2000 operating system are first sold to consumer. The company marketed Windows 2000 as its most secure operating system yet.
In San Francisco, California, Microsoft unveils the new Windows 2000 operating system. In an interview on CNBC television, Bill Gates, chairman of Microsoft, reports that the software cost more than a billion dollars to develop and involved over one thousand partners. The San Francisco launch ceremony featuring entertainment by Carlos Santa and Patrick Stewart. Microsoft claims that the new system is faster and more reliable than previous versions. It is based on the Windows NT series, however, the reliability comes at the loss of backward compatibility for some DOS-based games. Price: US$189 (Windows 95/98 upgrade) or US$129 (Windows NT upgrade) Visit the official Windows 2000 website.
2007
According to comScore Networks Inc., the open source encyclopedia Wikipedia became the ninth most popular website in the U.S. in January 2007, breaking into the top ten for the first time in history with 42.9 million unique visitors for the month of January.
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