The Great Geek Manual

1909
Kinemacolor films are shown to a paying audience for the first time at the Palace Theatre on Shaftesbury Avenue in London, England. The show features twenty-one short films altogether.

1935
Scottish physicist Robert Watson-Watt demonstrates the feasibility of radar (RAdio Detection And Ranging) to Air Ministry officials in Daventry, England. Watson-Watt had discovered the possibility of using radio waves to detect aircraft while experimenting with methods of using radio waves to locate thunderstorms. During the demonstration, a bomber flying through the main beam of a BBC short-wave radio transmitter reflects signals to the ground as it passes overhead. Read more about the early history of radar.

1966
The first Saturn 1B rocket is launched from Cape Canaveral,on an unmanned suborbital test flight, as part of the Apollo program. The AS-201 mission demonstrates the structural integrity of the Saturn 1B rocket, which combines five F-1 rocket engines, and its ability as a launch vehicle to carry future Apollo loads with its 7.5 million pounds of thrust. Despite several malfunctions, the rocket flies for thirty-seven minutes over 5,264 miles (8472 km), reaching a peak altitude of 303 miles (488 km).

1970
National Public Radio (NPR) is incorporated as a non-profit corporation. Visit the official NPR website.

1986
Warrants are issued for the arrest of seven local users of the The Phoenix Fortress BBS in Fremont, California. The Sysop turns out to be a local law enforcement agent and the board turns out to be a sting operation created to catch hackers and pirates. Three of the arrested users are fifteen years old, two are sixteen, one is seventeen, and one is nineteen. Their computers and some additional equipment is confiscated.

1988
The science fiction film Alien from L.A., directed by Albert Pyun and starring Kathy Ireland, William R. Moses, Richard Haines, Don Michael Paul, and Thom Mathews, is released to US theaters. In it, a nerdy teen girl discovers strange underground civilization while looking for her missing father. Running time: 1 hr 27 mins

1991
Tim Berners-Lee introduces WorldWideWeb, the first web browser and WYSIWYG HTML editor. See a screenshot at the World Wide Web Consortium’s website.

1993
Acclaim Entertainment releases the platform game Bart’s Nightmare for the Super Famicom in Japan. The game is based on the television series The Simpsons.

Konami releases Batman Returns for the Super Famicom in Japan.

1996
Nintendo releases Nester’s Funky Bowling for the Virtual Boy in the US. Visit the game’s official website. ESRB: KA (Kids to Adults)

Silicon Graphics Inc. acquires Cray Research for US$767 million, becoming the leading supplier of high-speed computing machines in the US. Read more about the history of Cray super computers.

1997
3Com announces that it will acquire US Robotics, the world’s largest maker of consumer modems for US$6.6 billion in stock. Visit the official 3Com website.

Anthony Zboralski, age 21, signs a deal with a major French publisher to write a book on battling computer piracy. Three days earlier, Zboralski was fined US$8,850 and given an eighteen month suspended sentence for making a quarter of million dollars in phone calls at the expense of theFederal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). The Frenchman accomplished the theft through social engineering by befriending a contact at the local embassy who unwittingly gave him enough information to tap into the FBI’s computer system.

The University of Montreal Biomedical homepage is anonymously hacked.

1998
Acclaim releases the hockey game NHL Breakaway ‘98 for the Nintendo 64, Playstation, and Sega Saturn in Europe and the US. ESRB: E (Everyone)

Capcom releases the fighting game X-Men vs. Street Fighter for the PlayStation in Japan.

Sony releases PlayStation memory cards in black, candy orange, cherry red, crystal, emerald, gray, island blue, and lemon yellow.

1999
Activision releases the expansion SiN: Wages of Sin for the first-person shooter (FPS) SiN for computers. The expansion features seven new weapons, seventeen new locations, ten new enemies, and two new bosses. ESRB: M (Mature)

Intel introduces the Pentium III processor, which operates at 450 or 500MHz and features 9.5 million transistors, a 100MHz bus, and a 64-bit bus. The processor is based on a 0.25 micron process, and it introduces seventy new Streaming SIMD Extensions (SSE). Code-name: Katmai

Konami releases the stealth action game Metal Gear Solid for the PlayStation in PAL regions. OFLC: M15+

The website of Z-Rock 106.7 FM is hacked by “Shadow, Nightmare, Screech & Zonis”. View an archived version of the defaced website.

2000
The website of Elite Hackers is hacked by “sCr33n DuMp”. View an archived version of the defaced website.

2001
The Andromeda episode “The Sum of Its Parts” first airs. (No. 118) In it, the crew are contact by a drone from a race of sentient machines who attempt to force Rommie to join the race’s collective consciousness.

Crave Entertainment releases Record of Lodoss War: Advent of Cardice for the Dreamcast in the US. The game is a roleplaying game reminiscent of Diablo. It’s based on the anime series Record of Lodoss War. ESRB: M (Mature)

Gathering of Developers releases the racing game 4×4 Evolution for the PlayStation 2. It is the first console game to be playable online across multiple platforms, including the Dreamcast, Macintosh and Windows. ESRB: E (Everyone)

2002
Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) demonstrates the next-generation 64-bit processor, codenamed “Hammer.” Read more about Hammer architecture at Extreme Tech.

EA Games releases Command & Conquer: Renegade for Windows in the US. Visit the game’s official website. ESRB: T (Teen)

Eidos Interactive releases EOE: Eve of Extinction for the PlayStation 2 in the US. ESRB: T (Teen)

Sony announces that it is releasing a new line of discounted “greatest hits” titles for the PlayStation 2, priced at US$25 each. Game titles will be eligible for greatest hit status eight months after their release and after they’ve sold over four hundred thousand copies. The first of the games will be released on April 1.

2003
After a three-and-a half-week jury trial, Oleg Zezev, a Kazakhstan citizen, is convicted in a Manhattan federal court on one count of attempted extortion, one count of sending extortionate threats, one count of conspiracy to commit extortion, and one count of computer intrusion. Zezev, also known as “Alex,” hacked into Bloomberg L.P. computer systems in order to steal confidential information and then attempted to extort two hundred thousand dollars from Bloomberg by threatening to disclose the confidential information to Bloomberg’s customers and the media. Zezev was the chief information technology officer at Kazkommerts Securities in Almaty, Kazakhstan. In the Spring of 1999, Bloomberg provided database services to Kazcommerts. As a result, Kazcommerts was provided with Bloomberg’s software needed to gain access to Bloomberg’s services over the Internet. In March 2000, Zezev manipulated Bloomberg’s software to bypass Bloomberg’s security system in order to gain unauthorized access to Bloomberg’s computer system so that he could pose as different legitimate customers and employees. On eleven separate occasions during March 2000, Zezev illegally entered Bloomberg’s system and accessed various accounts, including Michael Bloomberg’s personal account. He then sent Michael Bloomberg an e-mail from Kazakhstan using the alias “Alex” with screenshots and an attachment to the e-mail stating that he had “all possibilities. I can log under the name of any Bloomberg user including Super Users such as yourself.” He then asked for payment and threatened, “There a lot (sic) of clever but mean heads in the world who will use their chance to destroy your system to the detriment of your worldwide reputation.” The letter ended with “Your security and reputation are in your hands.”

Global Star Software releases Airport Tycoon 2 for Windows in the US. ESRB E (Everyone)

Konami releases Evolution Snowboarding for the GameCube and PlayStation 2 in the US. ESRB: T (Teen)

The Star Trek: Enterprise episode “Canamar” first airs. (No. 217) In it, Archer and Trip are taken prisoner on a transport ship after being mistaken for smugglers. Memory Alpha entry

2004
Capcom releases Onimusha 3: Demon Siege for the PlayStation 2 in Japan.

John Zuccarini, age 53, is sentenced to thirty months in prison on charges of using over three thousand misleading internet domain names, such as BobTheBiulder.com, DinseyLand.com, and Teltubbies.com, which played upon misspellings and variations of legitimate domains in order to lure minors to pornographic websites. Zuccarini allegedly made one million dollar in advertising revenue with the scheme. Read more at the website of the US Department of Justice.

Nicholas Jensen, a freshmen at Iowa State University, is arrested and charged with electronic and mechanical eavesdropping, unauthorized computer access, and harassment after Jensen hacked into his former roommate’s email account, altered a messages his roommate had sent to a pastor regarding his desire to join the clergy to read as though it were a confession that he were a homosexual, and then sending the message to forty-five people on his roommate’s contact list, including friends and family members. These messages were sent both from his ex-roommate’s Hotmail and university accounts.

Success Corporation releases the scrolling shooter Psyvariar 2 for the Dreamcast, PlayStation 2, and Xbox.

2006
The world’s population reaches an estimated 6.5 billion people, according the the United States Census Bureau.

2007
The Ninja Team releases the Wiinja modchip for the Wii video game console. It allows the system to play DVD+R and DVD-R discs, among other things. It is the first chip of its kind for the Wii. Visit the official Wiinja website.

Nintendo releases the platform game The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time for the Virtual Console in North America. Visit the game’s official website. ESRB: E (Everyone)