1775
The first American-made book, entitled Impenetrable Secret, is advertised in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The book is printed and sold by Story and Humphreys. Their advertisement in the Pennsylvania Mercury announces that the book is “printed with types, paper and ink manufactured in this Province.”
1868
Christopher Latham Sholes, Carlos Glidden, and Samuel W. Soule of Milwaukee, Wisconsin are granted a patent for the “Type-Writer.” (US No. 79,265) The device is only equipped with capital letters and typists can’t tell if they were making errors because the paper can’t be seen as one is typing; however, it is the first practical device of its kind. It is described as an improvement upon their earlier type-writing machine, which they had filed an application for on October 11, 1867. The new features are “a better way of working the type-bars, of holding paper on the carriage, of holding, applying, and moving the inking-ribbon, a self-adjusting platen, and a rest or cushion for the type-bars to follow.” The device also features the QWERTY keyboard which will be used for typing for decades to follow.
1926
The College Board administers the first SAT exam.
1928
In Germany, a rocket-powered automobile built by Opel crashed during testing after reaching a speed of 156mph.
1931
Aviators Wiley Hardeman Post and Harold Gatty took off from New York on the first flight around the world in a single-engine plane.
1938
The first “oceanarium” opens at Marineland in St. Augustine, Florida.
1953
Sir Ian Jacob, Director-General of the BBC, announces development plans for the television service, including completion of the network to all UK regions. Television service will reach 97 per cent of the population, which is by far the highest proportion of any nation. The service will also add an extra two hours of programing to each day’s schedule. According to the plan, color television broadcasting can be introduced within ten years, subject to development of a backwards compatible system for monochrome sets.
1958
Texas Instruments, Inc. (TI) dedicates its Semiconductor Building located along North Central Expressway in Dallas, Texas. The ceremonial opening is marked by cutting a red ribbon across the entrance with a high-voltage arc which was activated by a “beep” from the United States satellite Vanguard.
1961
An X-15 jet airplane sets a new world speed record, traveling over 3,000mph at Edwards Air Force Base, California.
1964
A patent is issued to Jack St. Clair Kilby for his “Miniaturized Electronic Circuits,” which will later become known as Integrated Circuits (IC). (US No. 3,138,743) The patent application was originally filed on February 6, 1959, and he will assign it to his employer, Texas Instruments (TI). With it, he creates a new method of reducing the space taken up by an electronic circuit by which “all components of an entire electronic circuit are integrated into the body of semiconductor material.” Geoffrey W.A. Dummer had also conceived of such a device years earlier, but he never completed a working device. A few months after Kilby’s demonstration in 1964, an IC device in an improved form will be independently invented by Robert Noyce.
1971
RFC 172 is released establishing the File Transfer Protocol (FTP). Read RFC 172.
1982
According to Twin Galaxies, Scott Carter, age 17, scores a recording-setting 179,600 points after playing Atari’s Space Duel arcade game for thirty-two minutes at the Time Zone arcade in Mountain View, California. Play Atari’s official online version of Space Duel. Visit the official Twin Galaxies website.
An all-time historical low temperature of -117°F is recorded at the South Pole.
1983
Paul V. Mockapetris and Jonathan Bruce Postel of the University of Southern California run the first successful test of their automated Domain Name System (DNS), which allows users to use human-readable names for machines instead of needing to use the machine’s physical address. The DNS will replace the Arpanet’s increasingly bulky system of host tables contained in a single text file maintained by SRI International. The system requires Arapnet users to manually look up a website, then type in its twelve-digit numerical address, much as with a telephone. Craig Partridge, one of the pioneers of DNS, later described host tables an “operational nightmare.” Each night, everyone on a network had to copy the host table to get the latest version. Read a brief history of the Domain Name System at Harvard Law.
1989
Warner Bros. releases the superhero film Batman, directed by Tim Burton and starring Michael Keaton, Jack Nicholson, Kim Basinger, Billy Dee Williams, and Jack Palance, to 2,194 US theaters. The film is based on the DC Comic character Batman, created by Bob Kane and Bill Finger. Produced on a budget of US$35 million, the film will gross a record US$40,489,746 domestically in its opening weekend. The film will gross a total of US $251,188,924 domestically during the course of its theatrical run, and it will be both the highest grossing film of the year and the fifth highest-grossing film of all time. IMDB listing (MPAA Rating: PG-13) Running Time: 2 hrs 6 mins
1991
Sega Enterprises introduces its flagship game Sonic the Hedgehog for the Sega Genesis in the US. The game was created by Naoto Oshima (character designer), Hirokazu Yashuhara (game planner), and Yuji Naka (programmer) in fourteen months. A separate version will later be released for the Sega Mega Drive, the Sega Master System and the Game Gear. This game is the first game to popularize the Genesis in North America. It will eventually replace Altered Beast as the bundled game with the console.
1994
The Summer Consumer Electronics Show (CES) is held Thursday, June 23 through Saturday, June 25 at the McCormick Place and Chicago Hilton in Chicago, Illinois. At the event, Nintendo unveils the new name for Project Reality, the “Ultra 64″ or “U64,” and shows private demos of Killer Instinct and Cruis ‘N USA designed for the system. The Ultra 64 will later become the Nintendo 64 video game system. Visit the event’s official website.
1996
Nintendo launches the Nintendo 64 video game console in Japan. It features 64-bit 93.75 MHz MIPS R4000 Series RISC main processor, 64-bit 62.5 MHz graphics and sound coprocessor, 4.5MB of RAM, 32-bit color at 640×480 resolution, and four control ports. Reportedly, 300,000 units sell off shelves the first day and virtually as many SUPER MARIO 64 cartridges are sold. 1.3 million units will be sold by the end of the year, as many as Sony’s PlayStation sold in the whole of 1995. Price: ¥25,000
1997
Eastman Kodak Co. and Motorola Inc. announces a technology partnership to develop new lightweight, inexpensive digital cameras. The move is an effort to compete with Japanese competitors.
The Supreme Court declines to review the case of Alpex Computer Corp. v. Nintendo of America, letting the verdict stand in favor of Nintendo. The prevailing ruling reverses a jury’s former decision to award Alpex $208 million in damages for Nintendo’s alleged infringement on a 1977 Alpex patent for a system that displays video images.
1998
The WM/Poly-Poster macro virus is first detected. The virus takes victim’s Microsoft Word documents and posts them to public bulletin boards.
The US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia overturns an injunction that had prohibited Microsoft from requiring computer makers that license its Windows 95 operating system to also use its Microsoft Internet Explorer browser. The United States Department of Justice (DOJ) sought the preliminary injunction in October 2007, and it was granted by US District Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson on December 11th. However, the appeals court, by a 2-to-1 decision, will toss out the earlier decision, citing several procedural and substantive errors.
1999
Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) announces that it will market the processor code-named K7 as the Athlon processor. The name was chosen by AMD as short for “decathlon.” Athlon was the ancient Greek word for “Champion/trophy of the games.” The company announces that it has started shipping 500 to 600MHz processors to computer manufacturers. This processors feature a 512KB Level-2 Cache and a 200 MT/s front side bus. Visit the official AMD website.
2000
The Brazilian website of Economatica Software de Apoio a Investidores Ltda is hacked by “BiOS-BR”. View an archived version of the defaced website.
The website of Goodyear is hacked by “p1mp”. View an archived version of the defaced website.
2003
Apple Computer announces the sale of its one millionth iPod, just over a year and a half after the device’s release. Visit the official Apple website.
Apple Computer releases version 1.0 of the web browser called Safari, which Steve Jobs had announced on January 7, 2003. Visit the software’s official website.
Intel releases the 3.2GHz Pentium 4 processor, featuring hyper-threading, and system bus up to 800MHz. Price: US$637 in 1000 unit quantities
Linden Lab launches the multiplayer online virtual world Second Life. Visit the game’s official website.
Microsoft releases its mobile computing operating system, Windows Mobile 2003. It comes in four editions: “Windows Mobile 2003 for Pocket PC Premium Edition,” “Windows Mobile 2003 for Pocket PC Professional Edition,” “Windows Mobile 2003 for Smartphone,” and “Windows Mobile 2003 for Pocket PC Phone Edition.” Visit the official Windows Mobile website. Code-name: Ozone
In San Jose, California, Apple Computer holds its Worldwide Developers’ Conference, over five days. Apple announces new Power Mac G5 computers with Power PC 970 processors operating at up to 2GHz. The computers are scheduled to be available in August. Steve Jobs also demonstrates a new version of the Mac OS X 10.3, code-named Panther. The G5 is marketed as both the “fastest personal computer ever” and the “first 64 bit personal computer.” Both claims, however, are debatable. Many, however, will mark the release of the Mac G5 at the beginning of the era of 64-bit processors.
Version 0.3 of Miranda IM, a minimalistic open source multiprotocol instant messenger designed for Microsoft Windows, is released. This version marks a major advance for the software in that it no longer requires that the ICQ instant messenger be installed. Another major change is the removal of the Send-Receive Messaging Module from the core into the SRMM plugin. This reduces the size of the program’s executable file and encourages the development of alternative messaging modules. Miranda IM 0.3 allows users to send messages via AIM, ICQ, Jabber, and MSN. Visit the software’s official website. Visit the official Miranda IM website.
2004
Google acquires a 2.6% stake in Baidu, the leading Chinese search engine, for US$5 million. Baidu searches audio files, images, and websites. Aside from being one of the most-used search engines in the world, Baidu also features a collaborative encyclopedia similar to Wikipedia, and a keyword-based discussion forum.
Intel releases the Pentium M 715 and Pentium M 725 processors with speeds of 1500 and 1600MHz respectively, featuring 2048KiB Level 2 Caches and 400MT/s front side buses. Price: US$209 and US$241 respectively
Yahoo! changes its instant messaging language yet again to kill third-party services like Trillian, from accessing its service. As in previous statements, the company claims that the block is intended as a preemptive measure against spammers. Cerulean Studios released a few patches to fix the issues within a day or two. Visit the official Yahoo! Messenger website.
2005
The Mozilla Foundation announces that Firefox 1.1 (which will become Firefox 1.5) and other new Mozilla products will no longer support the Mac OS X v10.1 operating system. The decision is intended to improve the quality of Firefox releases on Mac OS X v10.2 and above. Users of Mac OS X v10.1 will still be able to use Firefox versions in the 1.0.x branch. Visit the official Firefox website.
2006
Nintendo releases the Nintendo DS Lite handheld game console in Europe. It is a slimmer, brighter, and more lightweight redesign of the earlier Nintendo DS model. Visit the official Nintendo DS website
2008
Technology research firm Gartner reports that the number of personal computers in use around the world has exceeded one billion. The firm also reports that, while fifty-eight percent of computers are owned by U.S., Japanese, or European users, emerging markets are projected to account for seventy-percent of the next billion computers. Visit the official Gartner website.
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