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Optical Fiber
In 1970 Corning Glass announces it has created a glass fiber so clear that it can communicate pulses of light. GTE and At&T soon begin experiments to transmit sound and image data using fiber optics, which completely transforms the communications industry. -
First Video Game
Nolan Bushnell, who at the time was 28 years old, created Pong, a table-tennis themed game, which was one of the first mass-produced video games. He also went on to found Atari. -
Barcode
In 1974 the very first barcoded items were shipped out to grocery stores. Barcodes are read by laser scanners, and they made the old hand-punch type cash registers obsolete. -
Microsoft
In 1975 old high school friends Bill Gates and Paul Allen form Microsoft. They sell their first software to Ed Roberts at MIT, which produced the first microprocessor based computer. -
Super Computer
In 1976 Cray Research, Inc. introduces the first supercomputer, the Cray-1, which can perform operations at a rate of 240,000,000 calculations per second.