1906 Lee de Forest invents the “Audion” amplifier, a triode vacuum tube, predecessor to vacuum-tube valves, transistors and semiconductor chips, Palo Alto, Calif.

1927 Electronic television: Philo T. Farnsworth, San Francisco, 7 September 1927

1935 Magnetic audiotape recorder: AEG K1 Magnetophon; BASF tape

1938-41 Computing: Z1-Z3 electromechanical computers: Konrad Zuse, Germany. Destroyed in bombings of Dresden

1937-39 Computing: ABC computer: Atanasoff & Berry, Iowa State Univ

1940 Motorola SCR 536 Handie Talkie 2-way radio

1943 December: Colossus Mk 1, first programmable, electronic digital computer. Designed by Tommy Flowers for the Bletchley Park cryptanalysis effort to break German codes, with contributions by Max Newman and Alan Turing; UK

1944 Harvard Mark 1 computer: designed by Howard Aiken, built by IBM

1945 Memex (memory extension) machine proposed: Vannevar Bush, Manhattan Project

1946 ENIAC, Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer, Mauchly and Eckert, Univ of Pennsylvania

1946 Television set: RCA 630-TS

1947 Transistor: invented by team at Bell Labs including William Shockley, John Bardeen and Walter Brattain

1948 Vinyl LP, long-playing 12-inch music disc: Columbia Records

1950 Diners Club: first payments card

1951 UNIVAC, Universal Automatic Computer, first to use magnetic tape, Mauchly and Eckert

1951 Fred Terman, Stanford Univ Dean of Engineering, founds the Stanford Industrial Park (now Stanford Research Park)

1954 Mass-produced computer: IBM 650

1954 Solid state silicon transistor: Bell Labs

1954 Photovoltaic cell: Bell Labs. Precursor to CCD cells and fiber-to-copper couplers

1955-1965 Fred Terman, Stanford Univ provost, solicits research proposals from the Pentagon for the Computer Engineering Dept

1955 Portable transistor radio: Sony TR-63

1956 Magnetic videotape recorder: Ampex VR-1000 quadruplex

1956 First generalized computer language: Fortran, IBM

1956 William Shockley leaves Bell Labs, founds Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory in Mountain View, Calif; first to advocate silicon for semiconductors

1957 Orbital satellite: Sputnik

1957 High-fidelity stereo LP

1957 Fairchild Semiconductor: researchers leave Shockley Semi to form Fairchild Semi, with an investment from Fairchild Camera and Instrument

1958 ARPA: Advanced Research Projects Agency

1958 American Express debit card

1958 Revolving consumer credit: BankAmericard. Bank of America; 1966 Visa interbank card

1959 Silicon chip, integrated circuit: Texas Instruments demonstrates integrated chips at the Institute of Radio Engineers show. Fairchild Semiconductor independently develops the planar process of photolithography for layering components in a silicon wafer 

1959 First completely transistorized mainframe computer: IBM 7090

1959 Xerographic plain paper photocopier: Xerox

1960 Laser: Hughes Research Labs. T. H. Maiman, also Basov, Gordon, Gould, Prokhorov, Schawlow, Townes, Zeiger et al.

1961 Packet switching: Paul Baran, RAND Corporation

1962 Intergalactic Computer Network described, J.C.R. Licklider, BBN

1962 Augment human intellect with computers and networks: Doug Engelbart, SRI

1962 Orbital satellite + PV cells + commercial telecommunications: Telstar I

1963 Hypertext: Ted Nelson

1963 Compact audiotape cassette recorder: Philips

1963 Computer graphics program with graphical user interface: Sketchpad, Ivan Sutherland, MIT

1964 “Understanding Media,” Marshall McLuhan

1964 “On Distributed Communications Networks,” Paul Baran

1964 Music synthesizer: Robert A. Moog

1965 Minicomputer: Digital Equipment Corporation PDP-8

1965 Moore’s Law: Number of transistors on an integrated chip doubles every 18 months; Gordon Moore, Fairchild Semi

1966 Revolving consumer credit: Interbank Card Association: 1969 Master Charge, 1979 MasterCard

1967 “The Medium is the Massage,” Marshall McLuhan and Quentin Fiore

1968 “Whole Earth Catalog,” Stewart Brand

1968 “The Art of Computer Programming (TAOCP),” Donald Knuth

1968 Intel: Fairchild Semi veterans Robert Noyce and Gordon Moore, founders

1968 December: Mouse + GUI + Hypertext + Video Conferencing: Doug Engelbart with Bill English, SRI; Mother of All Demos, San Francisco Civic Auditorium

1969 ARPANet: Interconnects networks at SRI, UC-Santa Barbara, UCLA, Univ of Utah

1969 ARPANET engineer Jon Postel helps develop the Internet domain system and most ARPANET protocols, UCLA. 1979 Postel’s Law influences the design of TCP/IP

1969 “Future Shock,” Alvin Toffler

1969 Unics: Bell Labs, renamed Unix

1969 CCD: Charge-coupled device converts light into digital signal, Bell Labs

1970 Xerox PARC, Palo Alto Research Center

1971 Programmable general-purpose microprocessor: Intel 4004

1971 Email @: ARPANET 

1971 Handheld scientific calculator: Hewlett-Packard HP 35

1972 Digital audio: Denon

1972 Don Valentine founds pioneering Silicon Valley VC firm Sequoia Capital, early investor in Atari and Apple Computer; model for future tech VCs

1973 Personal computer + GUI + mouse: Xerox Alto, Xerox PARC

1973 TCP/IP: Vinton Cerf, Stanford Univ and Bob Kahn, DARPA

1973 RFID (Radio-frequency identification): Mario Cardullo patents passive radio transponder with memory. Passive and semi-passive reflected power RFID tags demonstrated at Los Alamos National Labs

1974 Internet named: Bob Kahn, DARPA and Vint Cerf, Stanford Univ in paper on TCP

1974 “Computer Lib / Dream Machines,” Ted Nelson

1975 Personal computer: Altair 8800, using the Intel 8080 CPU; Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems (MITS), Albuquerque NM

1975 Homebrew Computer Club: Meets to demo Altair 8800, including Gordon French, Fred Moore, Steve Wozniak

1975 Microsoft: Bill Gates and Paul Allen, Albuquerque

1975 Home videotape cassette recorder: Sony Betamax

1976 Apple Computer, Cupertino

1976 Personal computer: Apple I

1976 Home videotape cassette recorder: JVC VHS

1976 Ethernet: Xerox PARC

1976 SATNet packet program: Links US, Europe by commercial orbital satellites

1976 Wireless microphone for live performance: John Nady

1977 First successful mass-produced personal computer: Apple II

1977 Public key cryptography: Ron Rivest, Adi Shamir, Leonard Adleman; later form RSA Security, Verisign

1977 Wireless Internet: SRI van on Interstate 280 south of San Francisco broadcasts TCP through satellite and wired ARPANET lines to USC, Los Angeles

1978 CBBS: Public dial-up bulletin board system

1979 Postel’s Law influences the design of TCP/IP: "be conservative in what you do, be liberal in what you accept from others"

1979 USENet BBS

1979 Personal media player: Sony Walkman

1979 Macintosh: Steve Jobs, Apple team visit Xerox PARC, view networked PCs, bitmapped GUI, object-oriented programming

1981 Mass-produced personal computer: IBM PC 5150

1981 Digital camera with CCD: Sony Mavica

1982 Portable video camera for consumers: Sony Betamovie

1982 Portable laptop computer: GRiD Compass 1101

1982 Sun Microsystems, Santa Clara CA. Virtual machines, network computing: “The network is the computer”

1982 Time Magazine names the computer “Man of the Year”

1983 Internet: ARPANET adopts TCP/IP for massive interconnection of unrelated networks

1983 Domain Name Server: Univ of Wisconsin

1983 Digital music: CD, Compact Disc: Sony and Philips. The later CD-ROM is an extension of the CD

1983 Mobile telephony: Motorola DynaTAC 8000X

1984 Breakup of Bell System. 1994: “Baby Bells” acquire, manage Internet backbone

1984 Mass-produced personal computer + GUI + mouse: Apple Macintosh

1984 “Neuromancer,” William Gibson

1984 "Information wants to be free," Stewart Brand

1984 "The Network Is The Computer," John Gage, Sun Microsystems

1985 The WELL, Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link: Stewart Brand et al. Influence includes the Electronic Frontier Foundation, craigslist, Salon, etc.

1985 Desktop publishing: Aldus PageMaker

1986 Digital video: Sony DVR 1000, D-1 digital videotape

1986 Wireless electric guitar and bass transmitter for live performance: John Nady

1987 Digital audio: Sony DAT, digital audio tape

1987 Photoshop, digital photo editing and effects. Developed by Thomas Knoll at the Univ of Michigan and brother John Knoll at ILM. 1988 acquired by Adobe

1988 CD-ROM file system standardized

1988 Digital solid state non-linear video editing: AVID

1988 Cellular telephony: Global System for Mobile Communications, GSM

1989 Consumer GPS receiver: Magellan NAV 1000

1989 Mobile telephony: Motorola MicroTAC

1990 Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) founded by John Gilmore, John Perry Barlow and Mitch Kapor. The first meet on The WELL and use it for forums

1991 Technology: 6 August: Tim Berners-Lee and Robert Cailliau launch the World Wide Web to the public, from a NeXt server at CERN, info.cern.ch

1991 Internet browser: Gopher, Paul Lindner and Mark McCahill, Univ of Minnesota

1991 Portable laptop computer: Apple PowerBook

1991 High Performance Computing and Communication Act of 1991

1991 Consumer digital camera: Logitech FotoMan

1992 JPEG compression standard for still images

1992 SMS text message: Neil Papworth to Richard Jarvis, Vodafone: “MERRY CHRISTMAS”

1993 MP3 compression standard for audio

1993 MPEG compression standard for video

1993 Graphical web browser: Mosaic, Marc Andreessen, Univ of Illinois + NCSA

1993 Personal Digital Assistant: Apple Newton

1993 Digital special effects integrated with live action celluloid film: “Jurassic Park”

1993 Digital advertising agency: Organic, Inc. 

1994 NSF auctions original 4 Network Access Points to Baby Bells: MAE Washington to WorldCom; San Francisco to PacBell; Pennsauken to Sprint; Chicago to Ameritech

1994 Yahoo! search engine founded

1994 Consumer modem: USRobotics Sportser

1994 Digital advertising agency: Razorfish 

1995 RSA Security splits, forms Verisign, website verification authority

1995 Digital animated feature movie: “Toy Story”

1995 AltaVista search engine founded

1995 Amazon.com

1995 Digital video format for camcorders: DV

1995 Craig Newmark founds craigslist

1995 Netscape Communications and Sun Microsystems announce release of JavaScript language for coding interactive apps on the web

1996 Mobile telephony: Motorola StarTAC, first clamshell flip-phone

1996 RFID (Radio-frequency identification): patent issued for battery-less RFID passive tag with limited interference

1996 Blog: “Scripting News,” Dave Winer

1997 Wi-fi wireless radio network protocol

1997 DVD, Digital Video Disc: Philips, Sony, Toshiba and Panasonic

1997 Home cinema: Pioneer 42-inch plasma flat screen TV

1997 PDA, Personal Digital Assistant: Palm Pilot

1998 Google search engine founded

1998 Bluetooth short-range radio protocol

1998 Personal digital media player: Diamond Rio PMP300

1998 Cloud computing: VMware. Virtual machines, network computing, all-OS hypervisor

1998 World Wide Web is global

1998 Peer-to-peer payments: PayPal founded. Acquired by eBay 2002

1999 Digital solid state non-linear video editing: Apple Final Cut Pro

1999 Blog + social network: "LiveJournal"

1999 Peer-to-peer online media distribution: Napster

1999 Personal Digital Assistant: Handspring Visor

2000 Consumer GPS: Selective availability limits switched off by US government 2 May

2001 Wikipedia founded

2001 Digital media marketplace, royalties and rights distribution: Apple iTunes

2001 Personal digital media player: Apple iPod

2001 Digital live action feature movie: “Star Wars Episode II;” “Once Upon a Time in Mexico”

2002 Peer-to-peer anonymous digital interbank payments network: Settlenet, PiiPN, iPay

2002 Social network: Friendster

2003 Social network: LinkedIn

2003 Social network: Myspace

2004 Social network: Facebook

2005 Social network: YouTube

2005 12 June: “Stay hungry. Stay foolish.” Steve Jobs commencement speech at Stanford quotes Stewart Brand in Whole Earth Catalog

2006 Social network: Twitter

2007 Apple iPhone

2009 Venmo digital payments network. Acquired by PayPal 2013

2010 Apple iPad

2017 Zelle interbank digital payments network