1895
Otto Steiger is issued a patent for the “Millionaire calculating machine”. Four thousand seven hundred of the 120 pound machines will be built over the next forty years, by Switzerland’s Hans Egli. The calculating machine’s main selling point is its ability to easily perform multiplication calculations.
1946
Tokyo Telecommunications Engineering, which will later be renamed Sony in 1958, is founded with about twenty employees. Read more at Sony’s website.
1952
The concept of the integrated circuit chip is first presented at a symposium on “Progress in Quality Electronic Components” in Washington, D.C. by radar scientist Geoffrey W.A. Dummer. He and his team of researchers at the Royal Radar Establishment of the British Ministry of Defense are developing methods of improving the reliability of the Royal Air Force’s radar systems. Dummer was working from a theory that it is possible to fabricate multiple circuits onto a single half-inch square of silicon, however, by 1956, his attempts to create such a functional circuit will fail.
1954
International Business Machines (IBM) announces the IBM 704 Data Processing System. the world’s first mass produced computer to feature floating point arithmetic hardware. The IBM 704 will leave a significant impression on the computer industry before it is withdrawn from market on April 7, 1960. Both the FORTRAN and LISP programming languages were first developed for the IBM 704, as well as the first music application, MUSIC. Physicist John Larry Kelly, Jr. of Bell Labs will synthesize speech for the first time in history on an IBM 704. A demonstration of the synthesis using the song Daisy Bell will inspire a scene in Arthur C. Clarke’s 2001: A Space Odyssey. Read more about the IBM 704 at its official IBM webpage.
1962
NASA announces that the Mercury-Atlas 7 (MA-7) manned orbital flight has been delayed several days due to checkout problems with the Atlas launch vehicle.
1963
The United States launches the Telstar II communication satellite on behalf of AT&T. On its tenth orbit, it transmits the first transatlantic television program seen in color. It succeeds AT&T’s original Telstar satellite, which ceased operating on February 21, 1962, when radiation from a high-altitude nuclear test causes transistor damage to the satellite. The Telstar II was built with shielding against such radiation.
1967
German-born American inventor Ralph Baer first tests his circuit for a simple block chase game, “Fox and Hounds”, on a standard television set. The game features one dot chasing another. The “hound” dot would disappear when it was caught. According to Baer, the game is the very first two-player video game, but Baer will later loose the game.
1975
The astronomy satellite Explorer 53 is launched to study X-rays.
1990
May 7 through Wednesday, May 9, the United States Secret Service and the Arizona Organized Crime and Racketeering Bureau implement Operation Sundevil, a series of raids on alleged computer hackers in Cincinnati, Detroit, Los Angeles, Miami, Newark, Phoenix, Pittsburgh, Richmond, Tucson, San Diego, San Jose, and San Francisco. Read more in Bruce Sterling’s The Hacker CrackDown.
The Star Trek: The Next Generation episode “The Most Toys” first airs. (No. 171) In it, an obsessed collector, determined to add Data to his private collection of unique items, fakes Data’s death. Memory Alpha entry
1992
Harper Collins publishes the fantasy novel Mistress of the Empire by Raymond E Feist and Janny Wurts as a hardcover. (ISBN-13: 978-0246133557) It is the third book in The Empire Trilogy. Length: 536 pages
NASA launches the Space Shuttle Endeavour, a US$2 billion replacement for the Space Shuttle Challenger, on its maiden voyage. (STS-49) It is the forty-seventh US shuttle mission. While capturing and correcting the orbit of a satellite, the astronauts will set new records for the duration of a spacewalk and the number of astronauts outside the craft.
1997
Grandmaster Garry Kasparov reaches a stalemate in the fourth of six games against IBM’s Deep Blue supercomputer.
Intel releases the Pentium II processor, featuring a new 66MHz bus interface called Slot 1, a 200MHz 32kB Level 1 cache, MMX instructions, and a 512kB Level-2 external cache. The processors are available at clock speeds of 233, 266, and 300MHz. The processor incorporates 7.5 million transistors using 0.35 micron process technology, performs at 613 MIPS (300 MHz), and is able to address 64GB of memory. This new processor’s advantages over its predecessor, the Pentium I, include an expanded instruction set (MMX) and a larger on-chip cache. Price: US$636 (233 MHz), US$775 (266 MHz), and US$1981 (300 MHz) in 1000 unit quantities. Code-name during development: Klamath
The Star Trek: Voyager episode “Displaced” first airs. (No. 166) In it, Crew members are replaced one-by-one with aliens from an unknown race. Memory Alpha entry
The website of Gjallarhornet is hacked anonymously. View an archived version of the defaced website.
1998
Compaq Computer reveals plans to lay off up to fifteen thousand Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) employees, or about twenty-seven percent of the company’s workforce, resulting in a write-off of US$2 billion following Compaq’s US$9.6 billion takeover of the company.
International Business Machines (IBM) announces the company’s fifth generation of microprocessor-based mainframe computers, the System/390 (S/390) G5.
1999
Foreign hackers deface three US government websites with messages condemning the NATO bombing of the Chinese in Belgrade, Serbia. The websites were the United States Department of Energy, the United States Department of the Interior and the National Park Service. The hackers also post pictures of the three Chinese journalists who died in the bombing to the website of the Interior Department. Read more about the incident at CNN.
Next Generation Online reports that they have discovered plans among major media outlets to attend the upcoming E3 trade show in Los Angeles, California to work up stories on violent content in video games. According to the report, some publishers have re-edited the demonstration videos that will be shown at the event to in the hope of not becoming a media target.
Visteon Rear Seat Entertainment Systems becomes available through United States automobile dealerships. The systems, designed for minivans, fit a Nintendo 64 video game system into the rear seats. Price: US$1,499
2000
Philippines authorities announce that they have no law allowing prosecution of the Manila woman suspected of creating the “Love Bug” virus that has damaged computer systems worldwide. Despite the set back, Philippine National Bureau of Investigation attempts to persuade a judge to issue a warrant to search the woman’s house, and on May 8th, the bureau will “invite” woman’s boyfriend Reomel Ramores, age 27, to answer question regarding the case. Investigators will finally seek a warrant under the Access Devices Regulation Act of 1998, which was chiefly written to protect against credit card fraud.
The website of Banco de Mexico is hacked by a Brazilian group calling themselves the “Cyb3r Fuck3rs”, whose members include: cutthroat, Pl4st1ck_3x, SysVinit, tH1JK, and VUG0. View an archived version of the defaced website.
2001
The 3Com Corporation announces plans to lay off about three thousand employees, or about thirty percent of its work force. Visit the official 3Com website.
The Andromeda episode “It Makes a Lovely Light” first airs. (No. 21-121) In it, Beka attempts to take the ship to Tarn-Vedra, a legendary planet which has been cut off from the slipstream for ages.
The Dell Computer Corporation reveals plans to lay off three to four thousand employees, or about ten percent of its workforce, over the next six months. Visit the official Dell website.
Nintendo releases Mario Party 3 for the Nintendo 64 in the US. ESRB: E (Everyone)
The official website of the Diablo II video game is hacked and defaced.
Ubisoft releases Myst III: Exile for Windows in the US. Visit the official Myst franchise website. ESRB: E (Everyone)
2003
Bandai releases .hack//Mutation for the PlayStation 2 in North America. It is based on the popular anime .hack//Liminality. ESRB: T (Teen)
During an online chat session, Brian Countryman, Manager of Microsoft’s Internet Explorer Program, publicly announces that the Internet Explorer web browser will no longer be distributed separately from the Windows operating system. Instead the browser’s development will be seen as a part of Windows’ evolution.
Nintendo releases The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker for the GameCube in Australia. Visit the game’s official website. OFLC: G8+
The Star Trek: Enterprise episode “Regeneration” episode first airs. (No. 223) In the episode, a small group of Borg are recovered and revived after being frozen under ice in the Antarctic. Memory Alpha entry
The US subsidiary of Infogrames Entertainment, Infogrames North America (Infogrames NA), adopts the Atari brand and registered trademark for all its operations and renames its European operations “Atari Europe,” effectively changing the name of the entire subsidiary to Atari. Infogrames acquired the Atari holdings division of Hasbro in early 2001, and Infogrames also spins this original division off into a separate corporate entity, Atari Interactive. The company’s main holdings will remain named Infogrames Entertainment. Visit the official website of the Atari brand.
2004
Atari releases Transformers for the PlayStation 2 in Europe. The game is based on the animated series Transformers: Armada. Visit the game’s official website. PEGI: 7+
Sven Jaschan, the eighteen year old computer science student who authored the Sasser worm, is arrested in Rotenburg, Lower Saxony, Germany. Shortly after his arrest, he reveals to authorities that he also wrote the Netsky worm.
TDK Mediactive and THQ releases Conan for the PlayStation 2 in Europe. Visit the game’s official website.
Universal Pictures releases the monster movie Van Helsing, directed by Stephen Sommers and starring Hugh Jackman and Kate Beckinsale, is released to 3,575 US theaters. In the film, infamous monster hunter Van Helsing and his sidekick Carl travel to Transylvania to battle monsters out of legend, including Dracula and the Wolfman, in order to keep the Count from bringing his undead children to life. Produced on a budget of Us$160 million, the film will gross US$51,748,040 domestically in its opening weekend. Visit the film’s official website. IMDB listing MPAA Rating: PG-13 Running Time: 2 hrs 10 mins
2006
The AForce Project releases the arcade-style shooter AirForce2 for personal computers. Visit the game’s official website.
Rolling Stone magazine publishes its one thousandth issue. Visit the official Rolling Stone website.
2007
ABC Entertainment President Stephen McPherson announces that the science fiction series Lost will air during the 2009-2010 season with a “highly anticipated and shocking finale.” Read the original press release online. Visit the official Lost website.
Konami releases the light gun shooter Elebits for the Wii in Australia. Visit the game’s official website.
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