1580
Sir Francis Drake first circumnavigates the globe.
1887
Émile Berliner receives a patent for the Gramophone. (US No. 372,786)
1903
The New Zealand Wireless Telegraphy Act receives Royal Assent from the Governor of New Zealand. The act is a pre-emptive move to give the state a monopoly on wireless operations, as, at this time, there is are no wireless transmissions. The act established that the penalty for unauthorized wireless transmission or reception is £500.
1908
In one of the earliest known examples of software bundling, Edison Phonographs advertised in the Saturday Evening Post come with recordings of the Democratic and Republican presidential candidates.
1914
The US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is established to regulate commerce by the Federal Trade Commission Act.
1937
Street and Smith Publications launches a half-hour radio program featuring The Shadow, with Orson Welles in the title role.
1947
Mobile Telephone service begins along the Boston-Washington highway.
1960
In Chicago, the first televised debate takes place between US presidential candidates is broadcast. The debate is between Richard M. Nixon and John F. Kennedy, and it has an astounding impact on public opinion, swinging the election for the far more telegenic Kennedy who will win the election.
1973
A Concorde sets a new record for crossing the Atlantic Ocean faster than any other plane in history.
1975
Intelsat IV-F1 geostationary satellite is launched.
1982
According to Twin Galaxies, Kenneth Vance, age 18, scores a record-setting 722,500 points on Gravitar by Atari Inc. after playing the game for two hours and thirty-nine minutes at the Tilt Arcade in Las Vegas, Nevada. Visit the official Twin Galaxies website.
The science fiction action television series Knight Rider, created by Glen A. Larson and starring David Hasselhoff, premieres on the NBC network premieres with the episode Knight of the Phoenix (Pt.1). (No. 101) In the episode, Detective Michael Long is saved by billionaire Wilton Knight after being shot and left for dead in the course of an investigation. He is given a new face and a new name, Michael Knight, and he is equipped with the cutting edge Knight Industries Two Thousand (KITT), an artificially intelligent car fitted with a wide array of spy gadgets. The series will run for four seasons of ninety episodes. TV.com entry
1983
Hacker Neal Patrick, age 17, of the notorious hacking group 414s testifies before the U.S. House of Representatives about the ease of computer break-ins and the manner in which they might be stopped. The “hacker,” who has admittedly broken into dozens of computer systems nationwide, including those at the Los Alamos National Laboratory, Security Pacific Bank, and the Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, explains to Congress how easy and dangerous hacking is and how simple it would be to stop. The 414s hacking exploits, along with the much sensationalized film WarGames, had awoken a national awareness of the danger of hackers. “There was no damage, but the potential for damage was enormous,” Neal Patrick said of his activities and those of six friends known as the “414s”, after the area code of their hometown of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Six bills concerning computer crime will be introduced in the House later that year. As a result of these laws against computer criminality, white hat, grey hat and black hat hackers try to distinguish themselves from each other, depending on the legality of their activities.
Soviet military officer Stanislav Petrov averts a worldwide nuclear war by certifying that an incoming nuclear missile attack reported by a computer system is a false alarm without any verification and against policy. Read more at BrightStarSound.
1991
Four men and four women enter the Biosphere 2, an airtight, self-contained structure in Oracle, Arizona, where they will live for two years. The 7.2 million cubic foot sealed structure contains five biomes, including a nine hundred thousand gallon ocean, a rain forest, a desert, agricultural areas, and a high tech human habitat. It was built in the late eighties with US$150 million in funding by Texas oil magnate Edward Bass. It was designed to simulate the Earth’s environment (Earth being designated “Biosphere 1″) and to support its inhabitants without need for any outside intervention. The project’s final success will be debatable. The team will manage to remain within the structure until the pre-determined exit date of September 26, 1993; however numerous interventions will be required for a various reasons, including to fumigate for ants, to deliver oxygen, and to respond to health emergencies. Visit the official website of the Biosphere 2.
1993
The four men and four women who have lived in the Biosphere 2 since September 26, 1991, emerge amidst an uproar of criticism. Over the course of their much publicized experiment, the inhabitants encountered many difficulties. Unexpectedly limited agricultural productivity restricted the inhabitant’s diet, and they reported continual hunger. Micro-organisms in the soil reduced oxygen levels in the atmosphere at a steady pace of 0.3% per month and increased the nitrous oxide levels until pure oxygen had to be injected into the environment from outside sources. Carbon dioxide levels also fluctuated wildly, and most of the vertebrates and pollinating insects died off. A second mission was began on March 6, 1994. Visit the official website of the Biosphere 2.
1994
The trial of O.J. Simpson on two murder charges begins in Los Angeles. For months to come it will be shown live (”gavel to gavel”) on television in the US and other countries around the world. It is the first trial to aired live, and it will mark the beginning of a significant increase in the US media’s interest in court proceedings. Many critics, however, the excessive media exposure will result in a miscarriage of justice.
1995
Sunsoft announces suite of business-oriented development products incorporating Java.
1996
Iomega launches Zip-Across-America at a ceremony at the National Mall in Washington D.C. A promotional bus will make a seventeen stop tour of America promoting Iomega’s mass storage devices including the Zip drive which stores 100 megabytes on a single 3.5″ removable disk costing around $15 to $20 each.
1997
NEC Home Electronics releases Comic Road for the NEC PC-FX video game console.
1998
Actual Entertainment releases GUBBLE 2 for personal computers. Price: US$39.95
2000
ATI Technologies, Inc. announces that the new line of Apple iBook computers ships standard with a RAGE Mobility 128 chip. The chip provides “top flight graphics and DVD capabilities.”
GameDaily Newsletter reveals that The Navarre Corporation, a distribution and publishing company based in New Hope, Minnesota, has acquired two operating divisions of Beamscope, a Candian-based distributor and marketer of video game accessories. Visit the company’s official website.
Yahoo! launches Yahoo! Experts.
2003
Jeffrey Parson, age 18, of Hopkins, Minnesota is arrested for creating and releasing a variant of the Blaster Computer Worm, which launched a type of distributed denial-of-service attack (DoS) attack known as a a SYN flood against port 80 of the Microsoft site windowsupdate.com. The damage to Microsoft’s website was minimal because the attack targeted windowsupdate.com, which merely redirected browsers to windowsupdate.microsoft.com. Microsoft temporarily shut down the targeted site to minimize potential effects of the worm without loosing a great deal of legitimate traffic. The worm contained two messages, “I just want to say LOVE YOU SAN!!” and “billy gates why do you make this possible ? Stop making money and fix your software!!”
Version 5.8.1 of the Perl programming language is released.
2005
Intel releases the 3,000 MHz Xeon LV 3.0 processor, featuring a 2,048KB Level-2 Cache and an 800 MHz Front-Side Bus for servers and workstations. Code-name: Irwindale Price: US$519
Intel releases the 3,200 MHz Xeon MV 3.2 processor, featuring a 2,048KB Level-2 Cache and an 800 MHz Front-Side Bus for servers and workstations. Code-name: Irwindale Price: US$851
Intel releases the 3,800 MHz Xeon 3.8 processor, featuring a 2,048KB Level-2 Cache and an 800 MHz Front-Side Bus for servers and workstations. Code-name: Irwindale Price: US$487
2006
Microsoft acquires the Isreali research firm Gteko for US$110 million and merges the company into Microsoft Research. Visit the official Microsoft Research website.
Square Enix releases the roleplaying game (RPG) Valkyrie Profile 2: Silmeria for the PlayStation 2 in North America. Battles consist of a three-dimensional battle terrain and includes elements not seen in the game’s predecessor, such as the ability to pincer and attack the enemies from behind. Time doesn’t flow while the player is not moving and not holding the left thumbstick down, giving players the time to plan their next move and examine the displayed areas that enemy units may attack. Visit the game’s official website. ESRB: T (Teen)
The Warner Brothers film The Lake House becomes the first film to be issued on all three popular DVD formats simultaneously: Blu-ray Disc, HD DVD, and standard DVD.
2007
A hacker posts the personal data of twelve hundred eBay users, including their credit card numbers, on eBay’s Trust & Safety forum. eBay will claim that the credit card numbers are not the ones associated with the user names listed, but the incident still raises serious concerns over eBay’s security.
Microsoft releases the Live Search Video service.
Sharp Corporation announces that it will release a Blu-Ray high-definition DVD recorder with a one terabyte disk drive, capable of storing up to 127 hours of high definition programming, on December 1 in Japan. The device will have the world’s largest storage capacity. Price: ¥300,000
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