1633
Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei is forced by the Inquisition to “abjure, curse, and detest” his heliocentric theories that the Sun rather than the Earth is the center of the Universe. He is also condemned to “formal prison of the Holy Office” for an indeterminate period served at the pleasure of the Inquisition’s judges and ordered to recite the seven penitential psalms once a week, every week for three years. However the Pope will moderate the sentence by specifying it would be served under house arrest.
1675
The Royal Greenwich Observatory is created by Royal Warrant in England by Charles II. Construction will begin on August 10, 1675 and finish the following year. The observatory’s primary uses will be practical astronomy: navigation, timekeeping, and mapping the star. Visit the official Greenwich Observatory website.
1946
Mail is transported via jet airplane for the first time in history.
1973
The first crew of the Skylab splash down safely after a record twenty-eight days in space. The Skylab is the first space station the United States launched into orbit. The Skylab was launched on May 14 1973. It was first manned on May 25th.
1978
Evidence of the first moon of Pluto is discovered by astronomer James W. Christy of the Naval Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona when he obtains a photograph of Pluto that shows the orb to be distinctly elongated. Furthermore, the elongations appeared to change position with respect to the stars over time. After eliminating the possibility that the elongations are produced by plate defects and background stars, the only plausible explanation is that they are caused by a previously unknown body orbiting Pluto at a distance of approximately 12,100 miles (19,600km) with a period of 6.4 days. Depending on the definition employed, the body is either the largest moon of Pluto or one member of a double dwarf planet of which Pluto is also part. The moon is named Charon, after the boatman in Greek mythology who took the souls of the dead across the River Styx to Pluto’s underworld.
1979
The software company Infocom is founded by a group of programmers from the Dynamic Modeling Group at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) staff and students led by Joel Berez, Marc Blank, Dave Lebling, and Albert Vezza. It will be notable for the numerous interactive fiction games and it’s one business application, Cornerstone, a database program developed at an absurd cost that will become an utter flop in the PC market, bankrupting Infocom. The company will be bought by Activision in 1986 and shut down in 1989, although Activision will release several popular titles under Infocom’s Zork brand.
1982
Bill Gates hires James Towne, a manager from Tektronix, to be the first president of Microsoft, effective July 6th. Visit the official Microsoft website.
Xerox introduces the 820-II computer, an update of the 820, featuring a 4MHz Z80A processor (updated from the 820’s 2.5MHz), 64KB RAM, a 74-key keyboard, a black and white monitor, a hard drive, the CP/M 2.2 operating system, and Word Star word processing software. Price: US$3,295
1990
Natsume Co., Ltd releases the side-scrolling shooter S.C.A.T.: Special Cybernetic Attack Team for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) in Japan. The game takes place in New York City. Fish-like aliens have invaded Earth, and the player must assume the role of a future soldier in order to destroy them and halt the invasion.
1992
US President George Bush presents Microsoft Chairman William Henry Gates III, age 36, with the National Medal of Technology. Gates is the richest person in the United States, with Microsoft stock worth US$6 billion excluding US$450 million sold throughout the years for tangible assets. Visit the official National Medal of Technology website
1994
Version 2.02 of RemoteAccess BBS, the popular MS-DOS bulletin board system (BBS), is released. Visit an archive of the RemoteAccess official website.
1995
Dean Fox leaves the Atari Corporation.
1996
GT Interactive releases the first person shooter (FPS) Quake for personal computers. The game was developed by Id Software. Quake combines a cutting edge fully 3D engine with a distinct art style to create what will be regarded as a feast for the eyes. For audio effects, Id recruited Nine Inch Nails lead singer Trent Reznor to produce unique sound-effects and ambient music. Furthermore, Quake introduces the ability to play a deathmatch between living opponents via the Internet rather than against computer operated characters, vaulting the game into unparalleled popularity. Visit the game’s official website. ESRB: M (Mature)
1998
CompUSA announces that it is acquiring the Computer City chain from Tandy for US$275 million. Tandy president Leonard Roberts explains that the company is selling chain in order to better focus on its Radio Shack operations. Visit the official CompUSA website.
The Learning Company and Broderbund Software jointly announce plans to merge the two companies. An informal joint telephone conference call is established at 8:45am EST to answer the questions of investors and analysts. Visit the official The Learning Company website.
1999
The first report of the brain signals of a live rat directly controlling a robotic arm is published by the journal Nature Neuroscience. The research will be hailed as a breakthrough by other scientists working to integrate computing technology into biology. The report, written by researchers at Duke University and the MCP Hahnemann University medical school details scientists’ efforts to teach laboratory rats to operate a water-dispensing robot with thought alone. Initially, the arm was activated when the rats pressed a lever, until the researchers identified the brain activity that corresponded to the act. Then, the robot was linked to a computer interpreting the rats’ brain signals. Their ultimate goal is to one day restore mobility to patients who have been paralyzed or dexterity to those who have lost limbs.
Lotus Development releases SmartSuite Millenium Edition Release 9.5. Price: US$399 US$149 (upgrade)
Sony Computer Entertainment of America (SCEA) releases the platform game Ape Escape for the PlayStation in the US. Visit the game’s official website. ESRB: E (Everyone)
2000
Eidos Interactive releases the cyberpunk-themed first-person shooter Deus Ex for Windows in North America. The game will receive almost universally positive reviews from critics and general industry acclaim and will be nominated for and win several Game of the Year awards. ESRB: M (Mature)
Microsoft announces it plans for implementing its new “.Net” technology platform.
Version 7.1 of the Slackware Linux distribution is released by creator Patrick Volkerding. Slackware is most notable for its policy of incorporating only stable releases of applications. It’s philosophy is to maintain its stability and simplicity, in an effort to be the most UNIX-like Linux distribution. Visit the official Slackware website or the official Slackware blog.
Winamp, a proprietary media player developed by Nullsoft, surpasses twenty-five million registrants. Visit the official Winamp website.
2001
Kelsey Grammer, the lead in the television sitcom Frasier, signs a four-year contract to star in forty-eight additional episodes for US$1.6 million an episode, becoming the highest paid actor in television. The previous record was held by the cast of Friends, who were reportedly paid US$20 million per season.
Midway Games, Inc. announces that it will no longer manufacture and distribute coin-operated video games due to “declining demand.” The company will now focus on developing games for home game platforms. The decision will result in layoffs of “less than sixty employees.” Visit the official Midway Games website.
Nintendo releases the Game Boy Advance in Australia and the United Kingdom.
Nintendo releases the platform game Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards for the Nintendo 64 in Europe.
Nintendo releases Super Mario Advance for the Game Boy Advance in Europe. This version is ported from the Super Mario All-Stars version of Super Mario Brothers 2 as well as the original classic arcade game Mario Brothers.
Nintendo releases the futuristic racing game F-Zero: Maximum Velocity for the Game Boy Advance in North America. Visit the game’s official website. ESRB: E (Everyone)
Version 10.0.4 of Mac OS X is released. Visit the official Mac OS X website.
2002
Titus releases Barbarian for the GameCube and Playstation 2 in the US. ESRB: T (Teen)
The membership of the blog host Xanga is estimated at 100,000 bloggers with one million hits a day. Visit the Xanga website.
2004
Atari releases Dragon Ball Z: Supersonic Warriors for the Game Boy Advance in the US. Visit the game’s official website. ESRB: T (Teen)
Capcom releases the Mega Man Anniversary Collection for the GameCube and PlayStation 2. The collection is a compilation of ten video games featuring Capcom’s Mega Man character, including Mega Man, Mega Man 2 – 8, Mega Man: The Power Battle, and Mega Man 2: The Power Fighters. Mega Man: The Power Battle and Mega Man 2: The Power Fighters are arcade games that saw only limited release outside of Japan. ESRB: E (Everyone)
Nintendo releases Mario Golf: Advance Tour for the Game Boy Advance in the US. Visit an archive of the game’s official website. ESRB: E (Everyone)
2005
The address of the Gmail webmail service is changed to http://mail.google.com/mail/ from http://gmail.google.com/gmail/.
EA Games releases Battlefield 2 (BF2) for Windows in Australia. BF2 is a first-person shooter with some strategy and RPG (role-playing game) elements developed by Digital Illusions CE (DICE) with a custom game engine. Visit the game’s official website. OFLC: MA15+
The European Space Agency (ESA) announces that the MARSIS radar experiment on board the Mars Express Orbiter is operational.
The SCO Group releases version 6.0 of OpenServer, a closed source version of the Unix computer operating system. SCO OpenServer 6 is based on the System V Release 5 UNIX kernel and features multi-threading application support for C, C++, and Java applications through the POSIX interface. OpenServer 6 features kernel-level threading and is bundled with numerous open-source applications including Apache, Samba, MySQL, OpenSSH, Mozilla Firefox, and KDE. Some improvements over OpenServer 5 include improved SMP support for up to thirty-two processors, support for files over one terabyte on a partition, better file system performance, and support for up to 64GB of memory. OpenServer 6.0 maintains backward-compatibility for applications developed for Xenix 286 onwards. In addition, SCO has changed their pricing and licensing scheme to provide customers twice the number of users, four times the number of CPUs and 4GB memory support for the same price as OpenServer 5.0.7. Codename: Legend
NVIDIA releases the GeForce 7800 GTX (codenamed G70, and previously NV47) graphics card. It is the first graphics processing unit (GPU) in the GeForce 7 Series. It supports the highest specification Direct X 9 vertex and pixel shaders, currently at 3.0. It is a natively PCI Express chip, but use of a bridge chip could allow an AGP version to be produced. NVIDIA’s SLI support has been retained and improved in this unit. Visit the official Nvidia website.
2006
3D Realms releases a playable single and multiplayer demo of the first-person shooter (FPS) Prey for Windows. The game is based on a heavily modified version of the Doom 3 game engine. The game was initially announced in 1995 but was repeatedly re-conceived. Visit the game’s official website.
International Business Machines (IBM) and the United States National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) announce that the Blue Gene/L, the first computer in the Blue Gene series of next-generation supercomputers, has achieved 207.3 TFLOPS on a quantum chemical application.
Nintendo releases the role-playing game (rpg) Magical Starsign for the Nintendo DS in Japan. CERO: A (All Ages)
Rockstar Games releases Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories for the PlayStation 2 in Australia and Europe. OFLC: MA15+ PEGI: 18+
SNK Playmore releases The King of Fighters XI for the PlayStation 2 in Japan.
US Vice President Dick Cheney refers to himself the Darth Vader of the Bush administration, sparking a chain of humorous reactions across the internet. Discussing the need to vigorously pursue military intelligence, Cheney told John King, “It means we need to be able to go after and capture or kill those people who are trying to kill Americans. That’s not a pleasant business. It’s a very serious business. And I suppose, sometimes, people look at my demeanor and say, well, he’s the Darth Vader of the administration.”
2007
The NASA Space Shuttle Atlantis returns safely to Earth with its seven crew members, ending its successful two-week mission to deliver an addition to the International Space Station. Aboard is Sunita “Suni” Williams, who set the female endurance record for spaceflight at 195 days. Read the NASA biography of Sunita Williams.
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