Digital Age
Microprocessor, personal computer, internet, mobile phone, web. The infrastructure that the next era will run on.
Part of First
10 moments in this segment.
- — Email. Ray Tomlinson at BBN sends the first networked email between two ARPANET-connected hosts. He picks the @ symbol because it wasn't in any usernames at the time.
- — Microprocessor (Intel 4004). November 1971: Intel ships the 4004, a 4-bit CPU on a single chip. 2,300 transistors. The microcomputer revolution it enables sells billions of devices over the next 50 years.
- — Mobile Phone. April 3, 1973: Motorola engineer Martin Cooper makes the first cellular phone call from a Manhattan sidewalk — to his rival at Bell Labs. The DynaTAC handset weighed 2.2 lb.
- — MRI. Raymond Damadian builds the first whole-body MRI scanner, "Indomitable". The first patient scan takes nearly five hours. Today's machines image in minutes; the technology wins the 2003 Nobel.
- — GPS (Navstar-1 Launch). February 22, 1978: the first GPS satellite. Full 24-satellite constellation by 1994. Made available to civilians (with deliberate accuracy degradation) in 1983; full precision since 2000.
- — Compact Disc. October 1, 1982: Sony and Philips ship the first CDs commercially — Japan first, then Europe and North America. The first CD album sold is Billy Joel's 52nd Street.
- — Portable Personal Stereo (Walkman). July 1, 1979: Sony introduces the TPS-L2 Walkman in Tokyo. 30,000 units sell in two months. Public space gets a soundtrack.
- — World Wide Web. March 1989: Tim Berners-Lee submits "Information Management: A Proposal" at CERN. The first web server goes live December 20, 1990. The web becomes public in August 1991.
- — Human Genome Project Completed. April 14, 2003: the International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium publishes the essentially-complete reference genome. 92% of the genome at <1 error per 10,000 bases.
- — iPhone. January 9, 2007: Steve Jobs introduces the iPhone at Macworld. "Today Apple is going to reinvent the phone." The App Store opens 18 months later.
