Day in Tech History

Day in Tech History Podcast, Blog 365 Days a Year!

March 22, 2019

March 23, 2001: Mir Crashes Down in Deorbit

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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Day in Tech History / Intel

March 21, 2019

March 22, 1981: RCA Selectavision Videodisc

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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Day in Tech History / Geek

March 20, 2019

March 21, 2006: The First Tweet and Twitter is Founded

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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Day in Tech History / Science

March 19, 2019

March 20, 1916: The Foundation of the General Theory of Relativity

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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Day in Tech History / Geek

March 18, 2019

March 19, 1997: First Consumer DVD Player Released in U.S.

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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Day in Tech History / Music

March 17, 2019

March 18, 2008: LimeWire Tries to go Legal

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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Apple / Day in Tech History / HP / Microsoft

March 16, 2019

March 17, 1988: Apple Sues Microsoft, HP over GUI

Happy St. Patrick’s Day! 1988 – The Graphical User Interface (GUI) is what we use daily to open up email, our web browser and even those apps on your smartphone or tablet. With the first real GUI came the first copyright infringement for it as Apple sued both Microsoft and Hewlett-Packard for stealing features from Macintosh’s interface. Hewlett Packard was also named for their New Wave desktop environment. Missing from the suit is Microsoft Presentation Manager, which became the interface for IBM’s OS/2. The lawsuit got muddied when Xerox sued Apple for the same thing. That instance got thrown out rather...

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Robert Goddard and the liquid fueled rocket

Day in Tech History / Science

March 15, 2019

March 16, 1926: First Liquid-Fueled Rocket Launched

1926 – Robert Goddard became the first man to launch liquid-fueled rocket. The liquid oxygen and gasoline mixture launched the 10 foot rocket, travelling at 60 MPH, to an altitude of 41 feet. The rocket was dubbed “Nell” and was launched in the cold climate in Auburn Massachusetts. The New York Times picked up on Goddard’s experiment, but wasn’t kind to him. They denounced his work, ultimately swaying public opinion. An unwavered Goddard put together a team and in 1930 continued his research. He made some great strides until 1945 when he passed away. His work and 214 patents gave way for scientists...

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Commodore / Day in Tech History

March 14, 2019

March 15, 1989: Amiga Plus Magazine

1989 – Antic Software publishes the first issue of Amiga Plus Magazine. It was the April/May edition and included an AMIGA Plus disk, which included the graphic programs created. Articles included everything from creating graphics, to your 1988 Federal Income Tax, Lattice C++ review to a Tetris review and more. Nat Friedland was the Editor and Arnie Cachelin the assistant editor. The Magazine had a short life – closing its doors in 1991. IBM 1050 Data Communications System First Unix manual page for cc Cisco acquires Webex for $3.2 Billion Twitter Launches Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadSubscribe! Apple Podcasts...

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