2012 – Facebook – trying to get a hold on photosharing – decides to not wait for their iPhone app to come out but instead purchase Instagram for 1 billion dollars ($300 million and 23 million shares of Facebook stock). The reason Facebook made the purchase was for the close to 50 million Instagram users. Facebook had plans to keep both companies separate, but found later that joining the two via databases would help both companies grow. The companies finalized the deal on September 6, 2012.
2014 – Mark Zuckerberg told the press he called President Barak Obama to bring his concerns to the table. The Facebook post talked about trust on the Internet, keeping it a shared space and how we should work together to create a secure environment.
“I’ve called President Obama to express my frustration over the damage the government is creating for all of our future. Unfortunately, it seems like it will take a very long time for true full reform.”
The NSA stated they do not use their technical abilities to impersonate US company websites. The refuted all reports.
2008 – SXSW Interactive keynote, Mark Zuckerberg was being interviewed by journalist Sarah Lacy. There was a lot of anticipation for the event, but things went south quickly (no pun intended). During the interview, Lacy starts talking about these books Zuckerberg writes into but never formally asked him about it. She gets a little befuddled because Mark was not picking up the ball.
She verbally notes the stall, which Zuckerberg replies “You have to ask a question.” That brought the audience into the conversation with a standing ovation. Trying to continue, Lacy finally made a question out of this story with Mark giving a 2 minute answer and not divulging that he “burned those books”.
Lacy then went to the audience for affirmation of the book burning. However, she instead got the comment “Talk about something interesting!”
Sarah responded with “Try to do what I do for a living. It’s not as easy as it looks…” That brought the audience into the conversation.
After that, people took to Twitter, wondering why Lacy wasn’t asking questions.
Finally, they ended the keynote with Lacy saying “I’m sorry to torture you for an hour.” The comment was not well-received.
1956 – The U.S. Semi Automatic Ground Environment (SAGE) was disclosed to the public. SAGE is a computer that connected hundreds of radar stations in the US and Canada as a one-stop monitoring of the sky. SAGE was commissioned and developed by MIT.
The project started in 1950 and SAGE became fully operational on June 26, 1958 (DC-01). By 1980, many SAGE sites were fully dismantled as other airborne detection systems took its place.
2008 – Facebook made an initiative to remove any picture showing breastfeeding. In return, 11,000 women posted pictures in protest.
On June 15, 2014, after the #FreeTheNipple campaign brought success, Facebook officially changed their stance on the subject. According to their “Does Facebook Allow Breastfeeding” FAQ page:
Yes. We agree that breastfeeding is natural and beautiful and we’re glad to know that it’s important for mothers to share their experiences with others on Facebook. The vast majority of these photos are compliant with our policies.
Facebook’s policy also states if people complain or its too questionable, they have the right to remove the photos. Basically, the baby must be fully engaged in the feeding so the nipple is covered.
There is still a lot of controversy surrounding this issue.
1982 – After a decent success of the Atari 400/800 line the company noticed the console was looking a little “old”. After all, the Atari 400 actually discolors upon UV light. The 400’s non-tactile keyboard was replaced with the 800’s raised key keyboard. Still, Atari felt they needed to bring this personal computer into the 80’s.Therefore, the 1200XL was born. It was a hybrid computer – using what they called “Sweet 16” – a byte language developed by Steve Wozniak. It was to manipulate 16-bit pointer data from an 8-bit system.
The Atari 1200XL also featured 64 KB of RAM and a redesigned cable port and keyboard layout. Unfortunately the community felt the 1200XL was poorly designed for certain ports were in the wrong place. There was also a color enhancement feature that couldn’t be used because it wasn’t connected to the monitor port.
1995 – The Federal Networking council officially coins the term Internet: the Council’s Committee on Computing, Information and Communications (CCIC) created the FNC on Sept. 20th, 1995 to act as a forum for networking collaborations among Federal agencies.From nitrd.gov
Resolution: The Federal Networking Council (FNC) agrees that the following language reflects our definition of the term “Internet. “Internet refers to the global information system that – (i) is logically linked together by a globally unique address space based on the Internet Protocol (IP) or its subsequent extensions/follow-ons; (ii) is able to support communications using the Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) suite or its subsequent extensions/follow-ons, and/or other IP-compatible protocols; and (iii) provides, uses or makes accessible, either publicly or privately, high level services layered on the communications and related infrastructure described herein.
This Day in Tech History podcast show notes for October 24
2011 – Jeff Bezos announces a new line of Kindle products including the Kindle Fire. This 10 inch tablet was Amazon’s rival to the iPad. It ran a version of Android that connected with Amazon store. The Fire would cost $199 and came with 30 days of Amazon Prime.
2008 – British Secret Service admitted they have been looking for the next agents. They mention that they have been looking far and wide for spies. That is why they went to Facebook. MI6 placed 3 ads on Facebook to look for people seeking career change.. ability to shake a good martini is preferred.
This Day in Tech History podcast show notes for September 28