1858
Donati’s comet discovered by Giovanni Battista Donati, becomes the first comet to be photographed. It is a bright comet that developed a spectacular curved dust tail with two thin gas tails, captured by an English commercial photographer, William Usherwood, using a portrait camera.
1924
Two two-seat Douglas World Cruiser (DWC) planes set down in Seattle, Washington after completing the first round-the-world flight in history. The planes, the Chicago and the New Orleans, were developed by the Douglas Aircraft Company for the US Army Air Service specifically for the purpose of attempting to fly around the world. Four of the planes had departed from Seattle on April 4, 1924, but the Seattle crashed in Alaska and the Boston was damaged beyond repair while crossing the Atlantic. Over the 175 days of their expedition, the Chicago and the New Orleans set down have traveled 23,942 nautical miles (44,342km). Read more at the U.S. Centennial of Flight Commission.
1928
Sir Alexander Fleming notices a bacteria-killing mold growing in his laboratory. The discovery will later become known as penicillin.
1944
The first musical comedy on television, Boys from Boise, is broadcast in the US.
1950
The first made for television movie, Dinner Date with Death, in the UK is screened by broadcast on the BBC.
1951
20th Century Fox releases the science fiction film The Day the Earth Stood Still, directed by Robert Wise and starring Michael Rennie and Patricia Neal, to US theaters. The film will go on to be considered one of the classics of the genre. IMDB listing Running Time: 1 hr 32 mins
1959
The Explorer VI satellite discovers an intense radiation belt around Earth and takes the first remote television footage of Earth’s meteorological conditions.
1969
A meteorite falls over Murchison, Australia. Only 100kg of the meteorite will later be found. Classified as a carbonaceous chondrite, type II (CM2). The meteorite will be suspected to have originated with a comet because of its high twelve percent water content. The discover of more than ninety-two different amino acids within the meteorite will lead to an intense study by researchers attempting to discover the meteorite’s origins. Nineteen of the amino acids are found on Earth, but the remaining amino acids have no apparent terrestrial source.
1980
At Microsoft, Bill Gates, Paul Allen, and Kay Nishi make the final decision to accept an IBM contract to produce languages and an operating system for IBM’s new microcomputer.
1981
Atari hosts a luncheon meeting for distributors in San Francisco, California to officially introduce Tempest featuring Atari’s newly developed QuadraScan Color Display system and Skill-Step feature.
1982
According to Twin Galaxies, Shawn Dybdall, age 16, scores a record-setting 12,822,460 points playing the Atari arcade game Dig Dug after playing for eight hours and sixteen minutes at the Tilt Arcade in Las Vegas, Nevada. Much later, on July 6, 2000, Mark Longridge will write, “I can say as an expert player, and as an owner of the machine, that 12 million points is 100% impossible. This is because round 256 (round 0 in 8-bit logic) is a “kill screen,” that is a screen which is impossible to clear. It’s impossible to clear because one of the pookas starts the round on top of your game, and the collision detection of the program doesn’t allow you to pump up anything right on top of you… My own personal best was 2.7 million set at Funspot in Weir’s Beach, New Hampshire, early this year. I have a 2.5 million on video tape.” Visit the official Twin Galaxies website.
The New York Times reports that Atari has lost more than US$310 million in only three months, and that Atari’s El Paso plant is being converted into a recycling center. Atari will rapidly fade from popularity, and Atari’s disposal of six million E.T. cartridges in a remote desert dump the day before will become a symbol to America’s media, investors, and consumers that the video game boom is, at least temporarily, over.
1987
Hackers from Brooklyn penetrate MILNET, accessing at least one computer. The breach will lead to the Department of Defense severing the links between the unclassified Military Network, or Milnet, and Arpanet, the early Internet.
The science fiction television series Star Trek: The Next Generation premieres with the episode Encounter at Farpoint. In it, the crew of the newly-commissioned USS Enterprise-D is challenged by Q, an omnipotent extra-dimensional being, to solve the mystery of a strange base in a manner that proves humanity’s worth. The episode will later be broken into two part for syndication, but for its premiere, it is shown in its full two-hour entirety. The series will run for 178 episodes over seven seasons. Memory Alpha entry
1992
Midway Amusement Games releases version 4.0 of Mortal Kombat to arcades in the US.
1994
The Atari Corporation and Sega announce a US$90 million settlement regarding possible patent infringements. Terms include US$50 million (less attorney fees) in prepaid royalties to Atari in exchange for more than seventy US patents and applications. Sega also receives 4.7 million shares or 7.4% of Atari in the arrangement for an additional US$40 million.
1997
Apple Computer launches the “Think Different” marketing campaign. The campaign features television commercials in which a free-verse poem written by copywriter Craig Tanimoto of the the Chiat/Day ad agency is read by Richard Dreyfuss. “Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The trouble-makers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules, and they have no respect for the status-quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify, or vilify them. About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things. They invent. They imagine. They heal. They explore. They create. They inspire. They push the human race forward.” The ad campaign will be a success for the company in every sense. It will be well-received by the press and highly effective in its purpose of raising the company’s profile. The campaign itself will also win numerous awards within the advertising community. The campaign’s slogan, “Think Different” is a play on the much earlier slogan “IBM Think” previous coined by Thomas J. Watson. Watch the original television advertisement at YouTube.
1998
The Microsoft Internet Explorer overtakes the Netscape Navigator to become the world’s leading web browser for the first time.
Microsoft pulls Office 97 Service Release 2 from distribution, to fix reported problems with the software’s installation.
PC Data, an industry sales audit bureau, announces that they have added eleven new retailers to their auditing network bringing the total to forty-nine. The new retailers include beyond.com, Buy Direct/CNET, Circuit City, Computer Discount Warehouse, The Future Shop, Hastings, Insight Enterprises, Internet Shopping Network, OfficeMax, Scholastic, and TEC Direct.
2000
Apple Computer announces that it will fall short of revenue and profit expectations for the period spanning July to September. As a result of the announcement, the price of Apple stock drops fifty-two percent to US$25.
Compaq Computer chairman Benjamin Rosen resigns.
2001
At a court hearing, Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly strongly suggests that Microsoft and the US Department of Justice settle their antitrust case, rather than proceed in court. The judge gives them until November 2 to settle the case.
2004
Technology columnist David “Doc” Searls begins keeping track of how many search results are returned by Google for the relatively new term “podcasts.” On his first search, the term returns a scant twenty-four results. By September 30, 2,750 results will be returned for the term, and by November 24, 2005, Google will return 103,000,000 hits for the term.
The US House of Representatives passes the Family Movies Act of 2004 as part of Bill HR 4077 “to enhance criminal enforcement of the copyright laws, to educate the public about the application of copyright law to the Internet, and for other purposes.” The Bill is sent to the Senate. The Family Movies Act indemnifies technologies and companies that re-edit films to excise “offending” scenes and dialog, a practice to which the Directors Guild of America (DGA) objects. This has been amalgamated in HR 4077 with measures to prevent piracy, which the film industry supports. Read more at the Library of Congress.
2005
The eDonkey 2000 shuts down pursuant to a cease and desist letter MetaMachine, the network client’s developer, received from the RIAA following a US Supreme Court ruling against Grokster that set a precedent by which makers of software that facilitates copyright infringement could be held liable for that infringement. However, the eDonkey Network remains available through other clients, such as aMule, eMule, MLDonkey, or Shareaza and other server based software.
2006
Hewlett-Packard (HP) announces that it will expand into the gaming market with the acquisition and integration of Canadian computer manufacturer VoodooPC for an undisclosed sum. The same day, Rahul Sood, founder of VoodooPC, announces the acquistion in his blog and explains that he and his brother Ravi, who co-founded the company, have been considering the move for over a year. He explains that, after more than a year of exploring the possibility of a merger with Dell and various Taiwanese manufacturers, the two finally settled on HP because of the “treasure trove of product innovations” produced by HP Labs. To the press he says, “Our passion has been to design the highest performance, personalised PCs. Our customers should continue to expect the highest level of personalised configurations, service and quality. The benefits of this acquisition to VoodooPC are immense, not least of which is having a direct conduit to HP’s unparalleled innovation and international presence.” As part of the acquisition, Rahul will become HP’s Chief Technology Officer for the newly integrated Global Voodoo Business Unit. The acquisition will be completed in early November.
The NASA Opportunity rover reaches the Victoria crater on Mars after having traveled a total of 5.7 miles (9.2km) over the course of its mission. Visit the official webpage of the Mars Exploration Rover.
Version 6.0 of the Microsoft Messenger for Mac is released.
2008
SpaceX Falcon 1 becomes the first privately developed liquid-fueled space launch vehicle to achieve orbit on its fourth attempt. Visit the official SpaceX Falcon 1 website.
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