-
Netscape Born
April 4, 1994 Ironically, 19 years to the day after Microsoft was formed, Marc Andreessen and Jim Clark create the Mosaic Communications Corporation, which will later be renamed Netscape Communications Corporation. Andreessen had developed the Mosaic web browser while working at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) at the University of Illinois. Previous post: Microsoft…
-
Microsoft’s First Hardware Product
April 2, 1980 Microsoft announces its first hardware product, the Z80 SoftCard. The SoftCard is a microprocessor that plugs into the Apple II personal computer allowing it to run programs written for the CP/M operating system. CP/M was a very popular OS for early personal computers along with much of the software written for it. In…
-
Gmail Launched
April 1, 2004 The now ubiquitous Gmail service is launched as an invitation-only beta service. At first met with skepticism due to it being launched on April Fool’s Day, the ease of use and speed that Gmail offered for a web-based e-mail service quickly won converts. The fact that Gmail was invitiation-only for a long…
-
Free … Your … Mind
March 31, 1999 The hugely successful motion picture, The Matrix, is released on this day. Many call it a classic (ok, that’s me), many call it influential (ok, me again), but no one can deny that the impact it had on many aspects of our society from the emerging tech culture, to the movie industry,…
-
Kodak Releases DC40
March 28, 1995 Kodak releases the DC40 camera, which is only the second digital camera for the consumer market. While introduced over a year after Apple’s QuickTake 100 camera, Kodak’s marketing was largely responsible for popularizing digital photography. This Day in Tech History Tech History provided by This Day in Tech History.com
-
20-Year Old Bill Gates Gives Address
March 27, 1976 Bill Gates gives the opening address at the First Annual World Altair Computer Convention in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Gates was still a student at Harvard but along with Paul Allen helped develop the version of the BASIC language sold with the Altair computer. Previous post: Melissa Unleashes This Day in Tech History…
-
Melissa Unleashes
March 26, 1999 The first e-mail virus to cause widespread damage and one of the fastest spreading viruses in history, Melissa was released into the wild on an early Friday morning and within three days would infect between 100,000 and 250,000 computers around the world. While the virus did not directly cause any damage, the…
-
Twister First Movie on DVD
March 25, 1996 The movie Twister becomes the first featured film put on DVD. FYI, it sounds really good in surround sound! Previous post: Mac OS X is Born This Day in Tech History Tech History provided by This Day in Tech History.com
-
Mac OS X is Born
March 24, 2001 Mac OS X 10.0, the first public version of Mac OS X, is released. The code name for this release was Cheetah, although Apple did not start using the code names for marketing purposes until Mac OS X 10.3, Jaguar. Previous post: Mir Falls From the Sky This Day in Tech History…
-
Mir Falls From the Sky
March 23, 2001 The Russian space station Mir burns up in the Earth’s atmosphere after fifteen years in orbit. The debris that isn’t burned up falls safely into the Pacific ocean between Chile and New Zealand, in a region from which governments had routed planes and ships away. The station, which was launched in 1986,…