1914
Transcontinental telephone service begins with a telephone conversation between Thomas A. Watson in San Francisco and Alexander Graham Bell in New York City in which they repeat their historic conversation from 1876.
1958
President Dwight Eisenhower signs the the National Aeronautics and Space Act into law, creating the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). The act was introduced very soon after the launch of the Soviet satellite Sputnik 1. Visit the official NASA website.
1985
Bill Gates of Microsoft sends John Sculley of Apple Computer a second memo suggesting that Apple license its Mac OS, this time naming three prospective companies who might wish to create Mac clones.
1993
A federal court jury in San Francisco decides Atari Games infringed a Nintendo patent for the security system in the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). Atari Games immediately announces that it will appeal the decision.
1994
The Interactive Digital Software Association (IDSA), which represents most leading video game publishers, presents a proposal for a new, voluntary, industry-wide video game rating system to Congress. The system that eventually will be established will be governed by the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB).
1996
Microsoft releases the Windows NT 4.0 operating system to manufacturers. The software is comprised of 16.5 million lines of code. Code-name: Cairo
Prodigy Services Company is renamed after being formally taken over by the investor group led by Greg Carr. Paul DeLacey is named Chief Executive Officer of Prodigy, Inc. Former Prodigy president, Ed Bennett, becomes the chairman of the new firm, known as Prodigy Ventures, Inc.
1997
Yahoo! announces its first stock split, a 3-for-2 common stock split.
1998
Two Cloverdale, California boys, both sixteen, plead guilty to charges that they hacked into government and military computers to extract unauthorized passwords and other information. Bill Zane, owner of Netdex, the Santa Rosa Internet Service that the boys used to launch their attacks, expressed the opinion that the punishment to ban unsupervised access to the Internet until the age 21 is not strong enough.
A United States Federal Judge orders Microsoft to hand over the source code for Windows 95 and other operating systems related to a pending lawsuit filed by Caldera, a small software company based in Utah.
1999
Ideallab! announces plans to ship an additional twenty thousand free personal computers to qualified applicants. Founder Bill Gross, attributes the overwhelming response from previous recipients and the initial feedback from advertisers for the decision to expand their base. Recipients also agree to use FreePCNet for Internet access which forces them to be exposed to offers and advertising.
2002
Version 3.05 of the O’Caml programming language is released. Visit the official O’Caml website.
2003
Version 2.00 of the Apple Public Source License is released. The Apple Public Source License is the open source and free software license under which Apple’s Darwin operating system was released. Read the text of the license.
Version 2.3 of the Python programming language is released. Python is a very high level general purpose language designed for readability. Visit the official Python website.
2005
Astronomers Mike Brown, Chad Trujillo, and David Rabinowitz of the California Institute of Technology announces the discovery of Eris, a possible tenth planet in our solar system. Its diameter is estimated at 2,100 miles, or about half again the size of Pluto. Its orbit is eccentric and inclined at about forty-five degrees to the main plane of the solar system. It was originally named 2003 UB313 on a photograph taken on October 31, 2003.
Sony Pictures releases the action film Stealth, directed by Rob Cohen and starring Josh Lucas, Jessica Biel, and Jamie Foxx, to 3,495 US theaters. Stealth will go on to be a colossal box office failure, loosing US$99.6 million and becoming one of the biggest box office losses of all time. In the film, the Navy develops a fighter jet piloted by an artificial intelligence. The jet is placed on an aircraft carrier in the Pacific to learn combat maneuvers from human pilots, but when the computer develops a mind of its own, it’s the humans who are charged with stopping it before it incites a war. Produced on a budget of US$135 million, the film will gross US$13,251,545 domestically in its opening weekend. IMDB listing (MPAA Rating: PG-13) Running Time: 2 hrs 1 min
Webcomics Nation, a webcomic hosting and automation service for online cartoonists, is launched. The site is an ad-supported site offering cartoonists unlimited web space for US$7 a month. Visit the official Webcomics Nation website.
Wizards of the Coast releases the ninth edition core set of the Magic: The Gathering card game. The set includes 359 cards: 110 common, 110 uncommon, 110 rare, 20 basic land, and 9 starter cards. Visit the set’s official website.
2008
The first commercial tidal power system is connected to the National Grid in Northern Ireland by SeaGen. The system features two submerged sixteen-meter turbines capable of generating up to 1.2 megawatts. Read more at Technology Review.
MGM releases the film WarGames: The Dead Code, directed by and starring Matt Lanter, Maxim Roy, Amanda Walsh, and Colm Feore, to DVD. The film is a sequel to the classic 1983 film WarGames. IMDB listing (MPAA Rating: PG-13) Running Time: 1 hr 40 mins
2009
Microsoft and Yahoo! announce a merger of the two companies’ web operations in a deal intended to loosen Google’s search engine dominance. Under the deal, Yahoo! searches will be powered by the Bing search engine and Microsoft’s adCenter will power Yahoo’s advertising, but Yahoo! will handle all of the companies’ premium search customer. In the United States, the two companies combined will hold roughly thirty percent of web searches, compared to Google’s sixty to sixty-five percent share. The agreement between the two companies is set to last for ten years, an unprecedented length in the fast-paced world of ecommerce. Read the official Microsoft press release.
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