1976 – The First Annual World Altair Computer Convention is held at the Airport Marina Hotel near Albuquerque, New Mexico. Bill Gates opens the convention with his position on software piracy. Of course, it was all about the Altair 8800. MITS (Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems) was a computer that came in kit form where you could build and improve upon it. Tablet PC Initiative Kevin Mitnick pleads guilty Dr. Who comes back out of mothballs. Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadSubscribe! Apple Podcasts | Android | RSS | More
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1994 – Microsoft released Excel 4.0. It included an Easter egg animation of the Excel logo crushing the numbers 1-2-3. Other Day in Tech History items: AOL and eBay cross marketing agreement Excel 4.0 is released The first Computers Freedom and Privacy Conference Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadSubscribe! Apple Podcasts | Android | RSS | More
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1802 – A patent for the first steam engine was issued to Richard Trevithick and Andrew Viviane. The machine was called the “Puffing Devil” or “Puffer”. The engine could produce 145 psi to push the car forward. Richard had two versions of the engine – one as a car and the other as a locomotive. The car was first demonstrated on December 24, 1801, unfortunately, the puffer engine suffered catastrophic failure as it overheated and caught fire. Eventually in 1804, Trevithick’s patent gave way to the first locomotive where he pulled ten cars along a track. He continued his work until...
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2001 – It’s called the “Deorbit” – Space Station Mir was a controlled re-entry into the Earth’s atmosphere. Ultimately, the space station burned up over the ocean by New Zeland. Some parts of Mir could survive the re-entry process, so putting the ship over a large body of water was the best way to reduce casulties. Still, New Zeland was at full alert if winds brought large pieces inland. The official statement had Mir at complete Deorbit around 5:59:24 GMT. Cold Fusion is achieved Game Boy Advance SP Microsoft closes Omniture Analytics. Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadSubscribe! Apple Podcasts...
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1981 – The first vinyl video record, a.k.a. the videodisc, hit stores in the U.S. The “Capacitance Electronic Disc” looked just like any other vinyl record protected in a plastic caddy and held 60 minutes of NTSC video. That is approximately 27,000 frames per second. However, the CED players did not make the impact RCA had hoped. Only 100,000 were sold by the end of the year. The “BetaMax vs. VHS” war was in full swing and the tapes were considerably smaller than the discs. Laserdisc was also available to the public, which led to a lot of confusion of formats....
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2006 – Jack Dorsey, Evan Williams, Biz Stone and Noah Glass launch Twitter (a.k.a. Twttr) with Jack’s first Tweet. “Just setting up my Twttr” went across the network of only a few followers. Similar to Alexander Graham Bell’s “Mr. Watson, come here” statement or “Mary Had a Little Lamb” into a wax cylinder. Twitter was officially founded, but still in beta. The group at first didn’t acquire the highly priced “Twitter.com” until they had a proof of concept. Six months in, Twttr needed their “i” and “e”. Hfury Apple TV begins Shipping Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadSubscribe! Apple Podcasts |...
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1916 – Albert Einstein sent a paper off to Annelen Der Physik. The paper was called “Die Grundlage der Allgemeinen Relativitatstheorie” – translated as “The Foundation of the General Theory of Relativity”. The paper included the Principle considerations about the Postulate of Relativity, Mathmatical auxiliiaries for establishing the general covariant equations, theory of gravitational fields, and Newton’s theory as first approximation. For years thereafter, people studied this theory and tried to prove or disprove it. Google Chome adds RSS support 3-COM exit strategy of high-end data networking Apple 20th Anniversary Macintosh (TAM) Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadSubscribe! Apple Podcasts...
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1997 – Toshiba – a member of the DVD consortium – put out the first consumer DVD player on November 1, 1996 in Japan as the SD-3000. After some initial changes (and having to change the DVD region code for U.S. based DVD players), Toshiba debuted two U.S. models – the SD-2006 and the SD-3006. The SD-3006 had two more analog outputs and a Y-Cr-Cb video out with selector. Both players could run in 16:9 or 4:3 mode, but had to be selected when not in use. The SD-2006 sold for $599 and the SD-3006 sold for $699. There are questions...
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2008 – The free peer-to-peer file sharing program who was under major fire decided to set up a fully legal DRM music store. With over 500,000 MP3’s from artists who are not on any major labels, the store allowed you to get lossless versions of this music. They planned a party at SXSW 2008 . Downloads were on a pay-per-track pricing – from 30 cents (on up) per song. There were no mention of how much an artist could get from those prices. The RIAA was still going after the software itself at this point. Ultimately on October 2010, an injunction...
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Jeffrey Powers would love to come on your show and discuss the events of technology history. Feel free to call him @ 608-205-4378. You can also Contact Jeffrey:
