Pioneers in Tech: Happy birthday to “Killer App” creator Dan Bricklin
Spreadsheet jockeys of the world, be sure to raise a glass this weekend to toast Dan Bricklin, born July 16, 1951, the co-creator of VisiCalc, the first spreadsheet program for personal computers.
Tech Time Warp: Where did Carmen Sandiego come from?
The same generation of schoolchildren who traveled the Oregon Trail also crisscrossed the globe in hot pursuit of one international supervillain named Carmen Sandiego. Apple’s early investment in the education market meant schools were filled with Apple IIs and children eager...
Tech Time Warp: The origin of the Oregon Trail
The real Oregon Trail began in Independence, Missouri, but for generations of American schoolchildren, the trail began in a Minneapolis classroom in 1971, when three student teachers combined their penchant for history with their knowledge of BASIC.
Tech Time Warp: Did you forget about the first iPhone?
As ubiquitous as the iPhone is today (and as many competitors as it has inspired), it can be difficult to think back to June 2007, when the first iPhone went on sale. Disrupting the Blackberry world, the iPhone of 2007 was...
Tech Time Warp: The Early Days of IBM
The monolith we know today as IBM got its start June 16, 1911, when the forward-thinking Charles R. Flint merged the International Time Recording Company, Computing Scale Company and the Tabulating Machine Company—all “computing and tabulating enterprises”—into the Computing-Tabulating-Recording Company,...
Pioneers in Tech: Lynn Conway’s story
For this week’s Pioneers in Tech, Lynn Conway is in the spotlight. Lynn, a 2014 Computer History Museum fellow, belongs on any list of technology pioneers for her work alone. Working at Xerox PARC, she invented scalable design rules for VLSI...
Tech Time Warp: Computer users smell a RAT
The tech acronym “RAT” has two meanings: “remote administration tool,” or the software your friendly network administrator uses to install software or troubleshoot your computer issues, and “remote access trojan,” or the malware a nefarious individual uses to wreak havoc...
Tech Time Warp: Happy 19th birthday to WordPress!
In this week’s Tech Time Warp, we’re celebrating one of the most well-known content management systems. This system powering more than 43% of the world’s websites (including this one) celebrates its 19th birthday this year. On May 27, 2003, co-founders...
Tech Time Warp: The 411 on the 404 page
For this week’s Tech Time Warp, we’re talking about the origin story of the 404 Page Not Found error code. This error code is about as frustrating as actually reaching a 404 page. For years, a neat story has circulated...
Pioneers in Tech: Ajay Bhatt, co-inventor of USB technology
For this week’s Pioneers in Tech, we’re looking into the story of the USB. Like so many now-ubiquitous innovations, USB technology has a fascinating origin story you probably don’t know—and it might make you think twice about the “old” USB...