David L. Farquhar on technology old and new, computer security, and more
Prior to August 1983, the concept of copyright applying to computer software wasn’t settled law. Companies had sued one another for copyright violation, but prior to Apple taking Franklin Computer to court for copying the ROMs and the operating system disks for the Apple II and Apple II+ computers, no case had gone to trial. On August 30, 1983, Apple prevailed over Franklin.
The privacy, or lack thereof, around streaming media has been bothering me lately. I’m sure some people would ask what took me so long. And I’m sure others would say I am overreacting. But it is a problem not very many people have talked about, and even fewer have tried to solve and then talk about. For me, the tipping point was the acquisition of Roku, a company I have long admired, by Fox, a broadcasting company. A media company, Fox or otherwise, tracking what I watch and injecting ads is way too Max Headroom for me, which led me to seek a Roku alternative.
The Dell Optiplex 3040 and 3050 Micro are useful machines when you need a small form factor, versatility, and affordability. They aren’t as hip and chic as a Raspberry Pi, but they are more expandable and, these days, they’re likely more affordable too. And if you’ve seen prices on computer gear lately, they are not e-waste.
At the end of August 2024, Anandtech shut down rather suddenly and unexpectedly, ending a run that dated back to April 3, 1997. I thought about writing something at the time, but really needed longer to collect my thoughts.
On August 29, 1953, the Tokyo Television Acoustic Company was founded. Later in the decade it merged with the Tokyo Electro-Acoustic Company, and the combined company took the name TEAC. The combined company specialized in designing and manufacturing tape recorders. But retro computer enthusiasts know TEAC for its awesome floppy disk drives.
Digg was a high flying news aggregation site from the early web 2.0 era that still exists today, but really in name only. It serves as a cautionary too for why high profile websites tend not to make major changes overnight. A major update, Digg v4, introduced August 25, 2010, caused the site to implode over the course of about 6 weeks during the late summer of 2010. Contemporary tech CEOs would do well to read up on it lest they repeat history.
Digg went from concept to being worth $200 million in about three years and was more popular than Reddit, which is now a $15 billion company. One ill fated change wiped out 90% of its value and its user base in a matter of six weeks.
On August 25, 1991, Linus Torvalds wrote a message that changed the world. He didn’t expect that when he wrote it, that’s clear from the message and some of the replies. He had something he wanted to share with his fellow hobbyists, and he wanted some feedback. He was working on a project, an operating system he called Linux. And on that Sunday afternoon, he announced Linux for the first time by posting a message to a Usenet group called comp.os.minix.
It was on August 24, 1995 that Windows 95 was released, amidst much anticipation. It was the most widely anticipated Windows release of all time, and the runner up really isn’t close. The idea of people lining up for blocks for a Microsoft product sounds like a bit of a joke today, and the more time goes on, the bigger of a joke it becomes. But I’m serious that in 1995 it happened.
Microsoft QuickBasic was a commercially available programming language for MS-DOS, initially released August 18, 1985. Qbasic, the Basic interpreter included with MS-DOS versions 5 and 6, was a cut-down version of QuickBasic. Most notably, the bundled version lacked the ability to compile programs into standalone executable files. But otherwise, the two were compatible.
On August 20, 1986, Adobe Systems held its initial public offering. Priced at around $11 per share, Adobe has split its stock six times since.