Today in Tech History – July 5, 2014

20140404-073853.jpgIn 1833 – Nicéphore Niépce died. He created the first permanent photograph in 1826– an image of the outside of his house.

In 1954 – The BBC broadcast its first daily television news bulletin. Richard Baker read the 20-minute bulletin billed as an “Illustrated summary of the news.”

In 1963 – Radio station WWVB began broadcasting standard frequencies in Fort Collins, Colorado for use by satellite and missile programs. Its time code was later used for synchronising power plants and coordinating telephone networks and eventually for setting alarm clocks.

In 2001 – Rob Flickenger and friends posted details of their now legendary 12db Pringles-can antenna to boost WiFi signal distance.

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DTNS 2271 – Nerdtacular, nerdtacular, it’s part of the vernacular!

Logo by Mustafa Anabtawi thepolarcat.comIs Tech getting jerky? We talk with Justin Young and Patrick Beja about apps like ParkingMonkey and ReservationHop. Plus illustrations by Len Peralta

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Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the music and Martin Bell for the opening theme!

Big thanks to Mustafa A. from thepolarcat.com for the logo!

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Show Notes

Today’s guest: Patrick Beja! Justin Robert Young! Many nerds!

Headlines

9to5Mac reports that Jean-Claude Biver, head of watch brands at LVMH told CNBC that Apple has hired one of watchmaker Tag Heuer’s sales directors. A source confirmed the hire to 9to5 Mac. Apparently, Patrick Pruniaux former Vice President of Sales and Retail for Tag Heuer was the person hired. Apple has not said anything publicly about the hire or whether they even believe watches exist.

The Verge reports the Pew Research Center released another in its series of reports on the future of the Internet called Net Threats. Pew asked the experts “By 2025 will there be significant changes for the worse and hindrances to the ways in which people get and share content online compared with the way globally networked people can operate online today?” Of the respondents, 35 percent said yes, while 65 percent said no. Among the threats specified, the respondents listed government crackdowns, Internet surveillance, and prioritization of near-term profits over the long term benefit of the Net, particularly net neutrality concerns. Another threat was overcompensating for the amount of information people are flooed with each day.

TechRadar reports Lenovo has received permission to acquire IBM’s low-end server unit from the anti-monopoly bureau of the Chinese Ministry of Commerce. The deal was announced in January and is also awaiting approval from the United States.

ZDNet reports the head of Google’s spam fighting team, Matt Cutts, is taking a break for a couple months. Cutts says he’ll be gone through October so he can be with his family more. Cutts is the target of a lot of consternation from folks who hate it when Google changes their search algorithm. Some speculate it may be a step towards Cutts leaving Google.The anti-spam team wills till be keeping sites from gaming search results int he meantime.

TechCrunch reports Nielsen’s US music report on the first half of 2014 shows the shift from music downloads to streaming continues. On-demand streaming was up 42% over the first half of 2013 while digital track sales fell 13% and album sales fell 11.6%. Vinyl sales rose 40% over 2013. Audio streaming is gaining parity with video streaming of music with 33.65 billion music tracks streamed compared to 36.64 billion music videos.

Wired reports that Nadim Kobeissi will release a bet aversion of an all-purpose file encyrption browser plugin called miniLock at the HOPE hacker conference in New York. The free and open source plugin is meant to make it easy to drag and drop files to encrypt so that no one but the intended recipient can unscramble them.

News From You

tm204 submitted the DasErste article about the NSA program X-Keyscore targets anyone who uses or visits sites for privacy protections tools like Tor or the Linux-based Tails operating system. German public television broadcasters NDR and WDR reporters analyzed X-Keyscore source code which indicated the program has targeted a German student who runs a Tor node. The EFF has noted that the more people who use the tools, the less helpful targeting users blindly will be for any surveillance efforts.

JalenJade on Twitter pointed out a story at iMedicalApps.com that studies demonstrating the efficacy and safety of an “artificial” or “bionic” pancreas for people with type 1 diabetes have been published in the New England Journal of Medicine and announced at the American Diabetes Association Scientific Session in San Francisco. The Boston University-based project uses an iPhone, a Dexcom G4 continuous glucose sensor and Tandem T:Slim insulin pump. 

KAPT_Kipper submitted the TorrentFreak article that SoundCloud has given Universal Music the ability to remove allegedly infringing copyright music from the service without consulting anyone or taking into an account a counternotice. DJ Mr Brainz had his paid account terminated due to repeated copyright infringements as a result of Universal’s capability. The DJ believes his use of the music was either authorized or fair use but when he sought clarification on the reason for the takedowns Soundcloud could not answer as UNiversal had removed the files directly.

Discussion Section: Reservation Hop

http://techcrunch.com/2014/07/03/everyone-seems-mad-at-reservation-hop-founder-admits-he-was-taken-aback-by-the-criticism/?ncid=rss

Monday’s show: Julio Ojeda-Zapata, Tech Writer, St. Paul Pioneer Press

 

Today in Tech History – July 4, 2014

20140404-073853.jpgIn 1951 – Bell Labs held a press conference announcing the invention of the junction transistor. Dr. William Shockley was featured at the conference.

In 1956 – The five-year-old MIT computer Whirlwind added the ability to input data directly with a keyboard. Programmers began to enjoy independence from punch cards.

In 1996 – Sabeer Bhatia and Jack Smith launched a free web email service called HoTMaiL, a play on HTML. Microsoft bought it a year later, and called it Hotmail for years, but it’s now Outlook.com.

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Subscribe to the podcast. Like Tech History? Get Tom Merritt’s Chronology of Tech History at Merritt’s Books site.

DTNS 2270 – Round Table edition

Logo by Mustafa Anabtawi thepolarcat.comVarious attendees at Nerdtacular help comment on the headlines of the day.

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Please SUBSCRIBE HERE.

A special thanks to all our Patreon supporters–without you, none of this would be possible.

If you enjoy the show, please consider supporting the show here at the low, low cost of a nickel a day on Patreon. Thank you!

Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the music and Martin Bell for the opening theme!

Big thanks to Mustafa A. from thepolarcat.com for the logo!

Thanks to our mods, Kylde, TomGehrke and scottierowland on the subreddit

Show Notes

Today in Tech History – July 3, 2014

20140404-073853.jpgIn 1886 – Karl Benz drove his Patent Motor Wagen on Mannheim’s Ringstraße, reaching a top speed of 16 km/h (10 mph) powered by a 0.75-hp one-cylinder four-stroke gasoline engine. It was the first public drive of what is considered the first purpose-built automobile.

In 1998 – Danielle Bunten Berry died of lung cancer. She was a pioneering game designer most famous for creating the multiplayer game M.U.L.E. in 1983.

In 1999 – At the Funspot Family Fun Center in Weirs Beach, New Hampshire, Billy Mitchell became the first ever to achieve a perfect score on Pac-Man.

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Subscribe to the podcast. Like Tech History? Get Tom Merritt’s Chronology of Tech History at Merritt’s Books site.

DTNS 2269 – DTNS, Interrupted

Logo by Mustafa Anabtawi thepolarcat.comScott Johnson is on the show to chat about Google’s acquisition of Songza and what this means for how we listen to music. Also get a preview of Nerdtacular!

MP3

Multiple versions (ogg, video etc.) from Archive.org.

Please SUBSCRIBE HERE.

A special thanks to all our Patreon supporters–without you, none of this would be possible.

If you enjoy the show, please consider supporting the show here at the low, low cost of a nickel a day on Patreon. Thank you!

Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the music and Martin Bell for the opening theme!

Big thanks to Mustafa A. from thepolarcat.com for the logo!

Thanks to our mods, Kylde, TomGehrke and scottierowland on the subreddit

Show Notes

Today in Tech History – July 2, 2014

20140404-073853.jpgIn 1897 – 23-year-old Guglielmo Marconi received a patent in England for his wireless telegraphy which we now call radio. The Wireless Telegraph and Signal Co. Ltd. was formed a few weeks later.

In 1928 – W3XK, owned by the Jenkins Television Corporation, went on the air becoming the first television broadcasting station in the US.

In 2001 – Bram Cohen first revealed BitTorrent on a Yahoo group called decentralization.

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Subscribe to the podcast. Like Tech History? Get Tom Merritt’s Chronology of Tech History at Merritt’s Books site.