steve wozniak

June 20, 2014: Smartphone Kill Switch

Jeffrey Powers @geekazine 0620, aggregator, airs, anthony michael hall, Bill Gates, book fire, day in tech history, Electronics, fire in the valley, IBM, ibm 1gb microdrive, imdb entry, joey slotnick, lotus, lotus 1 2 3, Microsoft, noah wylie, Nokia, Nortel, pirates of silicon valley, Podcast, sequel, silicon valley, Smartphones, steve jobs, steve wozniak, stitcher, Technology, technology history, Technology_Internet, television network, tnt television, wikimedia foundation 0 Comments June 20, 2025

Subscribe! Spotify | RSS | More

Microsoft

2014 – Microsoft and Google agree to the Kill switch technology. In a California bill SB-967, Smartphones built after July 1, 2015 will consist of a hardware or software option to “kill” the phone. Further, a $500 to $2,500 fine will be issued to anyone selling a stolen phone.

Once switched, the device will not be able to turn on, even during a hard reset.

Subscribe to Day In Tech History:

RSS Feed - iTunes - Android - Spotify - iHeartRadio

Facebook -

- RSS Bandwidth by Cachefly Get a 14 Day Trial

- Join me on Patreon and support Day in Tech History

1926 – First wireless phone is demonstrated
1989 – Lotus 1-2-3 version 3.0 is released
2000 – IBM 1GB Microdrive
2003 – Wikimedia Foundation is founded
2009 – Nokia purchases Nortel

Apple/ Day in Tech History

April 12, 1976: Apple’s 3rd Co-Founder Ronald Wayne

Jeffrey Powers @geekazine 0412, apple, apple computer, apple logo, apple stock, april 1, assets, billions, cisco, co founder, commercial spam, debts, emoticons, Google, gotomeeting, iTunes, partnership agreement, patent infringment, position, reason, Ronald Wayne, RSS, SEGA, Steve Job, steve jobs, steve jobs and steve wozniak, steve wozniak, SteveWozniak, twitter 0 Comments April 12, 2025

Subscribe! Spotify | RSS | More

April 12, 1976: Ronald Wayne gives up his 10% of Apple Stock

1976– What a position Ronald Wayne was in. He was the 3rd co-founder of Apple Computer on April 1 with 10% share. However, after two weeks Wayne sells his share for $800 back to Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak. The reason why was because if the company was to go under, he would be liable for any debts incurred. While a solid reason why (Wayne had assets that couldn’t be risked in that nature), it turned out to be one of the biggest mistakes as Apple is grossed in the billions. Wayne designed the original Apple logo and wrote the partnership agreement.

Subscribe to the Day in Tech History

Subscribe to Day In Tech History:

RSS Feed - iTunes - Android - Spotify - iHeartRadio

Facebook -

- RSS Bandwidth by Cachefly Get a 14 Day Trial

- Join me on Patreon and support Day in Tech History

emoticons are first suggested 😉
Sega is guilty of intentional patent infringment
First commercial SPAM is reported.
Cisco discontinues the popular Flip brand camera

Day in Tech History/ Google

April Fools Day History

Jeffrey Powers @geekazine 0401, aggregator, apple, april 1, beta, cyrix, Geek, gmail, Google, invitation, iTunes, RSS, Steve Job, steve jobs, steve jobs and steve wozniak, steve wozniak, SteveWozniak, twitter, webmail service 0 Comments April 1, 2025

Subscribe! Spotify | RSS | More

Watch out today, as the internet becomes a bevy of fake information. The joke telling pre-dates the internet, but since the world started connecting online, the hoaxes have gotten not only more elaborate, but more fun.

Did you know that John C. Dvorak wrote an article in 1994 about a bill that would make it illegal to use the Internet while intoxicated?

Did you know in 2006, Apple pranked an add-on to your iPod that could allow it to make phone calls?

ThinkGeek made a few pranks that ended up turning into actual products, such as Unicorn Meat and the iCade?

What one-eyed, one-horned, flying purple people eater are we going to see this year? Guess we’ll start to find out in the next 24 hours…

2004 – Google releases their Webmail service in “Gmail” . They release it as an invitation only beta. That would stay in effect until February 7, 2007.

Subscribe to Day In Tech History:

RSS Feed - iTunes - Android - Spotify - iHeartRadio

Facebook -

- RSS Bandwidth by Cachefly Get a 14 Day Trial

- Join me on Patreon and support Day in Tech History

Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak incorporate Apple Computer Company
Windows Mobile 6.1 released
Cyrix vs. Intel Lawsuit settled.

Computer/ Day in Tech History

March 5, 1981: Timex Sinclair ZX81 launched

Jeffrey Powers @geekazine 0305, aggregator, altair, apple, apple computer, Atari, barak obama, building computers, cheap computer, cto, first apple, fred moore, Geek, homebrew computer club, iTunes, kundra, menlo, menlo park, menlo park ca, Menlo Park California, popular computer, Sinclair Research, Sinclair ZX80, Sinclair ZX81, Steve Job, steve jobs, steve wozniak, SteveWozniak, Timex Corporation, Vivek Kundra, WMS Industries 0 Comments March 5, 2025

Subscribe! Spotify | RSS | More

1981 – The successor to the Sinclair ZX80, Britain’s most popular home computer – the Sinclair ZX81 was launched by Sinclair Research – a Timex Corporation. It was a popular computer mostly because of the price – £69.95 ($99) or £49.95 in kit form.

The cheap computer had only a fraction of components that an Apple II did. Yet the Apple II was around £699. The Sinclair ZX81 only had 1 kB RAM with option to upgrade to 16 kB. The graphics were only in monochrome and the Z80 CPU ran at 3.25 MHz – 8-bit. This was actually faster than the Apple II processor (1.08 MHz) and only outbested by the IBM PC (4.77 MHz at 16-bit). The TI99/4A procesor was a 3Mhz 16-bit chip.

You could get a tape drive and printer, bringing the system up to about £160 ($250). The computer was succeeded by the ZX Spectrum.

Subscribe to Day In Tech History:

RSS Feed - iTunes - Android - Spotify - iHeartRadio

Facebook -

- RSS Bandwidth by Cachefly Get a 14 Day Trial

- Join me on Patreon and support Day in Tech History

WMS Industries acquires Atari
President Barak Obama appoints Vivek Kundra as CTO

Day in Tech History/ Geek

March 1, 1990: The Raid of Steve Jackson Games

Jeffrey Powers @geekazine 0301, aggregator, apple, apple 1, apple confidential, Apple II, computer club, computer motherboard, definitive history, Electronic Frontier Foundation, first computer, hewlett packard, history of the world, homebrew club, IPO, iTunes, lisp programmers, Loyd Blankenship, march 1, msnbc, newsvine, Palm Inc., RSS, segway, selling computers, Steve Jackson Games, Steve Job, steve jobs, steve wozniak, technology history, Wheels of Zeus, woz 0 Comments March 1, 2025

Subscribe! Spotify | RSS | More

1990 – The secret service and Austin TX police raided Steve Jackson Games, along with the home of Loyd Blankenship, writer of GURPS Cyberpunk. Four computers, two laser printers and all of the companies’ hardware was seized. This was a part of a nationwide data piracy investigation.

It was a very sketchy reason for why the roleplaying and gaming company got raided this hard. This also brought on a six month battle to get back their hardware, which they finally were able to retrieve all but one hard drive. Finally, on October 21, 1990, Steve Jackson Games got to look at the warrant and reason why they were raided.

It turned out Blankenship was doing research for his book. He visited and talked alot about questionable topics at his home and at his work – Steve Jackson Games.

This incident sparked the creation of the Electronic Frontier Foundation – a nonprofit dedicated to the constitutional rights of computer users.

Subscribe to Day In Tech History:

RSS Feed - iTunes - Android - Spotify - iHeartRadio

Facebook -

- RSS Bandwidth by Cachefly Get a 14 Day Trial

- Join me on Patreon and support Day in Tech History

LISP Programmers Manual is released
Palm Inc gets it’s first IPO
MSNBC.com launches Newsvine

Apple/ Day in Tech History/ Science

February 6, 1971: Alan Shepard Golfs on Moon, 1985: Steve Wozniak Leaves Apple

Jeffrey Powers @geekazine 0206, aggregator, Alan Shepard, alan shepherd, apollo 14, apple, astronaut alan shepard, balls, collection tool, copyright infringement, day in tech history, fifth person, first golf, Geek, gil amelio, golf ball, golfs, gravity, historical events, iTunes, Kazaa, lander, moon, person to walk on the moon, Podcast, RSS, second person, shareholder, space side, steve wozniak, technology history, twitter 0 Comments February 6, 2025

Subscribe! Spotify | RSS | More

1971 – Moving to the Space side of Geek, Apollo 14 astronaut Alan Shepard hits the first golf ball on the Moon. He used a six-iron attached to a sample collection tool. He hit 2 balls, in which the second would have made Happy Gillmore look bad. Of course, the moon has 1/6 the gravity as the Earth does.

Alan B. Shepard Jr. was also the second person to travel in space and the fifth person to walk on the moon. His Apollo 14 piloting of the lander was deemed the most accurate.

Shepard died in 1998.

Subscribe to Day In Tech History:

RSS Feed - iTunes - Android - Spotify - iHeartRadio

Facebook -

- RSS Bandwidth by Cachefly Get a 14 Day Trial

- Join me on Patreon and support Day in Tech History

1985 – Steve Wozniak decides to leave Apple. He remains a shareholder on the board. He will come back as an advisor when Gil Amelio takes the reigns.
2004 – Austrailian officials raid Kazaa on copyright infringement.

Apple/ Day in Tech History/ Steve Jobs

February 4, 1997: Apple Acquired NeXT

Jeffrey Powers @geekazine 0204, acquisition, aggregator, apple, apple computer, Bill Gates, cmos, day in tech history, earthlink, executive committee member, gil amelio, historical events, iTunes, last game, mac os x, MindSpring, NeXT, NeXT Computer, openstep os, os x, Podcast, RSS, SEGA, Steve Job, steve jobs, steve wozniak, technology history 0 Comments February 4, 2025

Subscribe! Spotify | RSS | More

February 4, 1997 – Apple Acquires NeXT Computer

1997 – Apple Computer makes the acquisition of NeXT for $427 million. The OpenStep OS will be the base of Mac OS X. Steve Wozniak returns to Apple as an executive committee member. Gil Amelio – with Steve Jobs as his adviser – makes plans to restructure Apple. Finally, Bill Gates publicly states that he is very interested in continuing to work with Apple.

Subscribe to Day In Tech History:

RSS Feed - iTunes - Android - Spotify - iHeartRadio

Facebook -

- RSS Bandwidth by Cachefly Get a 14 Day Trial

- Join me on Patreon and support Day in Tech History

Sega releases the last game for the Master System – Bomber Raid
The 1GHz CMOS is demonstrated for the first time
EarthLink merges with MindSpring

Apple/ Day in Tech History

January 22, 1998: Microsoft and US Department of Justice

Jeffrey Powers @geekazine 0122, 3rd quarter, ad space, AOL, apple, apple macintosh 1984, blade runner, computer manufacturers, day in tech history, graphical user interface, interface gui, internet explorer, jan 24, launch, mac, macintosh, mhz motorola, Microsoft, Microsoft antitrust trial, motorola 68000 microprocessor, netscape, opportunity of a lifetime, Podcast, ridley scott, steve jobs, steve jobs and steve wozniak, steve wozniak, Super Bowl advertising, Super Bowl XVIII, superbowl, superbowl commercial, technology history, US Department of Justice, washington redskins 0 Comments January 22, 2025

Subscribe! Spotify | RSS | More

Microsoft

1998 – Microsoft reached an agreement with the US Department of Justice regarding Internet Explorer on Windows 95. In the agreement, computer manufacturers could have the IE link removed. This was a small step in the antitrust suit against Microsoft and using bundled software and drive out competition.

The Microsoft antitrust trial would begin on May 18, 1998 and go until November 5, 1999.