1932 – The BBC began public television broadcasts.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/1146543.stm

1955 – The first computer user group, SHARE was founded by users of IBM’s Model 704 computer. The first meeting was held in the basement conference room of the RAND Corporation.

http://amhistory.si.edu/archives/AC0567.htm

2007 – The Storm botnet sent out a record 57 million virus-infected emails. It failed to take down the Internet.

https://web.archive.org/web/20090803175547/http://www.fastcompany.com/blog/clay-dillow/culture-buffet/fast-history-storm-botnet-sends-57-million-emails-one-day-2007

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1920 – The first commercial radio station, 8MK, began operating in Michigan. Now, WWJ, it is owned by CBS.

http://nationalradioclub.org/articles/1stfacts.txt

1930 – W2XCR began broadcasting at 2.1-2.2 mHz from Jersey City, New Jersey, with the first demonstration of telecasts meant for the home. A half-hour program, hosted by the cartoonist Harry Hirschfeld, was viewed on screens placed in a store in the Hotel Ansonia, the Hearst building, and a home at 98 Riverside Drive.

http://www.earlytelevision.org/w2xcr.html

1970 – John Carmack was born in Shawnee Mission, Kansas. He would grow up to co-found id software and bring the world Doom, Wolfenstein and Quake.

http://www.notablebiographies.com/news/A-Ca/Carmack-John.html#b

2017 – Microsoft opened preoders for the XBox One X, a console which supported 4K video games.

https://www.theverge.com/2017/8/20/16160650/microsoft-xbox-one-x-project-scorpio-edition-preorders

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1839 – At a crowded meeting of the Paris Academy of Sciences, Louis Daguerre demonstrated the process of making photos called daguerreotypes.

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v144/n3642/abs/144341b0.html

1906 – Philo Farnsworth was born on Indian Creek in Beaver County, Utah. He would grow up to inspire the beloved professor character on Futurama. He also gets credit for inventing the first completely electronic television.

http://inventors.about.com/library/inventors/blfarnsworth.htm

1934 – Gordon Bell was born in Kirksville, Missouri. He would grow up to help build PDP computers and oversee the development of DEC’s VAX series.

http://www.thocp.net/biographies/bell_gordon.htm

2003 – Dave Winer posted an experiment with RSS enclosures. It allowed subscribers with the right aggregator to have an MP3 of an interview Chris Lydon did delivered with no click-wait. This would lead to Christopher Lydon becoming the first podcaster before it was called podcasting.

http://scripting.com/2003/08.html#When:9:49:05PM

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1937 – The first Frequency Modulation or FM radio permit was granted to W1XOJ, in Paxton, Massachusetts. It went on the air with scheduled programs in May 1939 and operated with the highest output power (50 kilowatts) granted prior to World War II.

http://nationalradioclub.org/articles/1stfacts.txt

1947 – Eight years after William Hewlett and David Packard founded it, Hewlett-Packard was officially incorporated.

http://books.google.com/books?id=KMSH_wzyDaEC&pg=PA113&lpg=PA113&dq=august+18+1947+hewlett+packard+incorporated&source=bl&ots=YfkA9g_uAY&sig=mDYAGbyTlXh-xMlVMVbqAEwJlCk&hl=en&sa=X&ei=gckHUoTJBI7OyAHKl4C4Aw&ved=0CHsQ6AEwCTgK#v=onepage&q=august%2018%201947%20hewlett%20packard%20incorporated&f=false

2005 – The largest and most widespread power outage in history happened on the Indonesian island of Java, affecting almost 100 million people.

https://www.upi.com/Millions-affected-in-Indonesia-blackout/37061124395633/

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1944 – Larry Ellison was born in the Bronx in New York City. 9 months later, after contracting pneumonia, he was taken to Chicago to be raised by his Aunt and Uncle. He would grow up to drop out of college, move to Berkeley and co-found Software Development Labs, one of the most successful corporations in history. Today it’s known as Oracle.

http://nordic.businessinsider.com/the-rise-of-larry-ellison-the-jet-setting-billionaire-founder-of-oracle-2017-1/

1982 – Royal Philips Electronics manufactured the world’s first Compact Disc (not counting test pressings) at a Polygram factory in Langenhagen, just outside of Hanover, Germany. The CD was “The Visitors” by Abba.

http://www.newscenter.philips.com/main/standard/about/news/press/20070816_25th_anniversary_cd.wpd

2000 – Nielsen/NetRatings announced that according to their data, more than half (52%) of United States households had Internet access for the first time. This confirmed Media Metrix’s report from April which estimated that 51% of US households now had Internet access.

http://www.zdnet.com/news/more-u-s-households-online-than-not/109736

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1989 – A solar flare created a geomagnetic storm that caused three hard drives to fail in an otherwise fault-tolerant system at the Toronto Stock Exchange. This prevented access to critical market data, leading the exchange to be shut down for three hours.

http://catless.ncl.ac.uk/Risks/9.15.html

1993 – Ian Murdock announced the Debian Linux distribution system. The name combined his then girlfriend Debra’s name with his own, Deb-Ian. And now you know how to properly pronounce it.

http://www.debian.org/doc/manuals/project-history/ch-intro.en.html

1994 – The IBM Simon went on sale, combining a mobile phone with computer functions. It weighed 500 grams, could run apps and be linked to a fax machine, selling for $899. The word smartphone hadn’t even been coined yet.

http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-28802053

1995 – The first version Microsoft’s Web browser, Internet Explorer 1, debuted. It was based on Mosaic, which Microsoft had licensed from Spyglass Inc.

http://gizmodo.com/5614186/internet-explorer-turns-15-today

2011 – Xiaomi launched its first phone, the M1 or ‘Xiaomi Phone’ with a 1.5 GHz dual core chip and 1 GB of RAM for ¥1,999.

http://www.engadget.com/2011/08/16/xiaomi-m1-with-miui-os-a-310-phone-with-1-5ghz-dual-core-soc-a/

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1877 – In a letter to T.B.A. David, president of the Central District and Printing Telegraph Company in Pittsburgh, Thomas Edison suggested using the word ‘hello’ to indicate a telephone connection was active. Alexander Graham Bell had reportedly preferred ‘Ahoy’ as the greeting.

https://www.nytimes.com/1992/03/05/garden/great-hello-mystery-is-solved.html

1960 – A long-distance phone link was tested using the Echo 1 satellite. William Victor placed a call from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory at Goldstone, California to William C. Jakes Jr. at the Bell Laboratories in Holmdel, New Jersey, bouncing off the satellite to make the connection.

http://todayinsci.com/8/8_15.htm

1994 – Microsoft programmer Benjamin Slivka sent an email to his team suggesting they make a Web browser for Windows 95.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/1996-07-14/inside-microsoft

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1888 – Mr. George Gouraud introduced the Edison phonograph to London in a press conference, including the playing of a piano and cornet recording of Sullivan’s “The Lost Chord,” one of the first recordings of music ever made.

https://www.gsarchive.net/sullivan/html/historic.html

1894 – The first wireless transmission of information using Morse code was demonstrated by Oliver Lodge during a meeting of the British Association at Oxford. A message was transmitted about 50 meters from the old Clarendon Laboratory to the lecture theater of the University Museum.

https://books.google.com/books?isbn=0262313421

1940 – John Atanasoff finished a paper describing the Atanasoff Berry Computer, or ABC, the computer he designed with Clifford Berry to solve simultaneous linear equations.

http://www.computerhistory.org/tdih/august/14/

1989 – Sega launched the Genesis console in the US. It had been released in Japan the previous October as the ‘Mega Drive.’

http://www.usgamer.net/articles/the-true-16-bit-experience-segas-genesis-turns-25

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1888 – John Logie Baird was born in Helensburgh, Scotland. He would grow up to invent the first working television system in the world.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/baird_logie.shtml

1912 – The US Department of Commerce issued its first experimental radio license in compliance with the International Radio Convention and Radio Act of 1912. St. Joseph’s College received a license with serial number 1 to operate 2 kilowatts station 3XJ.

http://nationalradioclub.org/articles/1stfacts.txt

2004 – Adam Curry launched an RSS feed of audio recordings called “Daily Source Code” and podcasting became a thing.

http://radio-weblogs.com/0001014/categories/dailySourceCode/2004/08/13.html

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1877 – Thomas Edison sketched his idea for the phonograph, and may have even completed a model. The first working model wasn’t completed until December 6.

http://www.americaslibrary.gov/jb/recon/jb_recon_phongrph_1.html

1960 – The first NASA communications satellite, Echo 1 was launched from Cape Canaveral. The satellite was a balloon of mylar polyester film.

http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/nmc/masterCatalog.do?sc=1960-009A

1977 – The space shuttle Enterprise carried out its first free flight test, when the orbiter was released from the back of a 747 in flight.

http://abcnews.go.com/Archives/video/aug-12-1977-shuttle-enterprise-test-9563114

1981 – IBM introduced the model 5150 personal computer. It had a 4.77 MHz Intel 8088 microprocessor and used Microsoft’s MS-DOS operating system.

http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/pc25/pc25_birth.html

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