1970 to 1980 Timeline Outline

Acquiring New Archival Material at the Rate of 1 Mile per Year
(Circa 1970)

PDP-11
(1970)

Xerox PARC is Founded
(1970)

The First Commercially Available DRAM Chip
(1970)

The First Packet-Switched Wireless Data Network
(1970)

Optical Fibers for the Internet Backbone
(1970)

Books on Tape
(1970)

The Architecture Machine
(1970)

The First Dot Matrix Printers
(1970)

Nitrous Oxide Impacts the Stratospheric Ozone Layer
(1970)

First Test of Magnetic Stripe Transaction Card Technology
(January 1970 – May 1973)

First Systematic Review of Computer Security Issues
(February 1970)

ARPANET Spans the U.S.
(March 1970)

The Definitive Model for Relational Database Management Systems
(June 1970)

System/370 Using Semiconductor Memory
(June 30, 1970)

PBS is Founded
(October 5, 1970)

UNESCO Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and Transfer of Ownership of Cultural Property 1970
(November 14, 1970)

The First General Patent on the Microprocessor
(December 1970)

The First Microprocessor
(1971)

Invention of the Laser Printer
(1971)

Speech Recognition Technology
(1971)

The Floppy Disk is Introduced
(1971)

Computer Structures
(1971)

The Arpanet has 15 Nodes
(1971)

The C Programming Language
(1971)

CT
(1971)

The Universal Product Code
(1971)

Intel 8008
(1971)

Phreaker Underground Telephone System Culture
(1971)

The First Computer Virus
(1971)

The First Comprehensive Treatise on Computer Graphics with the First History of Computer Art
(1971)

The @ in Email
(March 1971)

Gouraud Shading Method for Polygon Smoothing
(June 1971)

The First Email Management Program
(July 1971)

Invention of eBooks: The First Digital Library
(July 4, 1971)

The First Library to do Online Cataloguing
(August 26, 1971)

The Earliest Coin-Operated Computer or Video Game
(September 1971)

"A Calculator in Every Kitchen or Businessman's Pocket'
(September 17, 1971)

Medline is Operational
(October 1971)

The First Commercially Sold Coin-Operated Video Game
(November 1971)

The British Library is Established as a Separate Entity
(1972)

A Digital Library of Greek Literature
(1972)

Expensive Electronic Calculators Flood the Market
(1972 – 1974)

One of the First Touchscreens
(1972)

The First Handheld Scientific Calculator
(1972)

The First Patent for MRI
(March 17, 1972)

The First Home Video Game Console
(May 24, 1972)

Pong: The First Successful Computer Game
(June 27, 1972)

SPACEWAR: Fanatic Life and Symbolic Death Among the Computer Bums
(December 7, 1972)

One of the Most Widely Distributed Photographic Images: The Blue Marble Photograph of the Earth
(December 7, 1972)

The First Practical Method for Cloning a Gene
(1973)

Conceptually, the First Personal Computer System
(1973)

Lexis is Introduced
(1973)

Probably the World's First Online Community
(1973)

The First Public Computerized Bulletin Board System
(1973)

The First International Connections to ARPANET
(1973)

Editing Terminals for Newspapers
(1973)

First Electronic Pagination System, Forerunner of Email and Instant Messaging
(1973)

Invention of the Word "Internet"
(Circa 1973)

The Beginnings of Magnetic Resonance Imaging
(1973)

The First Major Film to Use 2D Digital Image Processing
(1973)

Discovery of Citation Mapping
(1973)

The First Networked 3D Multi-User First Person Shooter Game
(1973 – 1974)

The First Whole-Body CT Scanner
(1973)

CP/M
(1973 – 1974)

The Brain-Computer Interface
(1973)

The Politics of Nonviolent Action
(1973)

Precursor to "Micro-Soft"
(1973 – 1974)

2000 People Use the ARPANET
(March 1973)

Code of Fair Information Practice
(July 1973)

The ENIAC Patent is Invalidated
(October 19, 1973)

The Endangered Species Act of 1973
(December 28, 1973)

Foundation of the Biotechnology Industry
(1974)

Systems Network Architecture
(1974)

SQL
(1974)

The Term "Mainframe"
(1974)

The First Computer Employing RISC
(1974)

"A Sweeping and Controversial Program"
(1974)

Virtual Machines
(1974)

The First Computer Role-Playing Game, Dungeons & Dragons
(1974 – 1975)

The First Omni-Font Optical Character Recognition System
(1974)

Manifesto of the Microcomputer Revolution
(1974)

SGML is Invented
(1974)

CFCs Deplete the Ozone Layer
(1974)

Publication of the Index Thomisticus: Forty Years of Data Processing
(1974 – 1980)

The First Magnetic Card-Programmable Handheld Calculator
(1974)

The First Microprocessor for the First Personal Computer
(March 1974)

The Privacy Act of 1974
(May 1974)

TCP
(May 1974)

An Antitrust Suit to Break up AT&T
(November 20, 1974)

The First Computer Language Written for a Personal Computer
(1975)

The Fractal Geometry of Nature
(1975 – 1982)

Invention of Ethernet
(1975)

200,000 Computers are Operating in the U. S.
(1975)

Byte Magazine
(1975)

The Roots of the PostScript Page Description Language
(1975 – 1978)

The First Demonstrations of TCP/IP
(1975 – November 1977)

The First Computer Text Adventure Game
(1975 – 1976)

The Warez Scene
(Circa 1975)

"The Mythical Man-Month"
(1975)

Home Pong
(1975)

The First American Bookseller to Discount Books
(1975)

The Utah Teapot
(1975)

The First Book in the Graphic Arts Field Produced from Cold Type
(1975)

The First Personal Computer Offered for Sale
(January 1975)

The Asilomar Conference on Recombinant DNA
(February 1975)

The Homebrew Computer Club Holds its First Meeting
(March 1975)

Gates and Allen Officially Found "Micro-Soft" (Microsoft)
(April 4, 1975)

U.S. v. IBM is in Trial
(May 19, 1975)

IBM's First "Portable" Computer: $19,975
(September 1975)

Invention of the Digital Camera
(December 1975)

The First Commercially Available Laser Printer
(1976)

The First Word Processing Program for a Personal Computer
(1976)

First Print-to-Speech Reading Machine
(1976)

The CD is Developed
(1976 – 1983)

Public Key Cryptography
(1976)

The First Major Film to Incorporate 3D Computer Generated Images
(1976)

The First Journal on Software for Personal Computers
(January 1976)

An Open Letter to Hobbyists
(February 3, 1976)

Probably the First Personal Computer Conference
(March 1976)

Foundation of Apple Computer and the Origin of the Name
(April 1, 1976 – December 13, 2011)

Genetech is Founded
(April 7, 1976)

First CRT Based Word Processor
(June 1976)

The English Short Title Catalogue
(June 1976)

First Detailed Description of Ethernet
(July 1976)

The Apple I is Released
(July 1976)

Intel's 8086
(1977)

Prototype Cellular Telephone System
(1977)

Ellison Founds Software Development Laboratories
(1977)

The First Personal Computer Sold as a Fully Assembled Product
(1977)

A Technique for Sequencing DNA
(1977)

The Sanger Method of Rapid DNA Sequencing
(1977)

Inaugurating the Concept of Office Automation
(1977)

First Successful Video Game Console Using Plug-in Cartridges
(1977)

First Multi-Player Computer Games
(1977)

Making MRI Feasible
(1977)

Zork
(1977 – 1979)

Launching "Messages in a Bottle" into the Cosmic Ocean
(1977)

The First Hand-Held Entirely Digital Electronic Game
(1977)

TEX and Metafont
(1977 – 1979)

The First GPS
(February 1977)

The First Intentional Spam
(May 1, 1977)

The First Speech Synthesis Chip
(June 11, 1977)

A Printed Book Entitled Toward Paperless Information Systems
(1978)

The Network Nation
(1978)

dBase
(1978)

The First Computer Worm
(1978)

Early Interactive Computing and Virtual Reality
(1978 – 1979)

The 8086 Microprocessor
(1978)

The Minitel
(1978 – June 30, 2012)

Probably the First U. S. Legislation against Computer Crimes
(1978)

The First Dial-UP CBBS
(February 16, 1978)

Compuserve
(1979)

The First Spreadsheet Program
(1979)

Making Small Portable Digital Telephones Possible
(1979)

Robert Metcalf Founds 3Com
(1979)

The First Widely Used Music Scheduling System
(1979)

The Printing Press as an Agent of Change
(1979)

The First Graphical Computer Adventure Game
(1979 – 1980)

The American Association for Artificial Intelligence
(1979)

Probably the Smallest Set of Physical Books
(1979 – 1980)

Bjarne Stroustrup Develops the C++ Programming Language
(1979 – 1983)

Vol Libri: The First Fractal CGI Movie
(1979 – 1980)

Public Access to Electronic Information in a Museum
(1979)

Finding Additional Pages of the Codex Sinaiticus
(May 1979)

The Basis for Cellular Telephone Technology
(May 1, 1979)

Intel 8088
(July 1, 1979)

Origins of the Computer History Museum
(September 1979)