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25,000 BCE
Paleolithic Cave Art
In archaeology, cave paintings are a type of parietal art (which category also includes petroglyphs, or engravings), found on the wall or ceilings of caves. The term usually implies prehistoric origin. These paintings were often created by Homo sapiens, but also Denisovans and Neanderthals; -
3100 BCE
Egyptian Hieroglyphs
Egyptian hieroglyphs were the formal writing system used in Ancient Egypt for writing the Egyptian language. Hieroglyphs combined logographic, syllabic and alphabetic elements, with more than 100 distinct characters. Cursive hieroglyphs were used for religious literature on papyrus and wood. -
31 BCE
Cuneiform
Cuneiform is a logo syllabic writing system that was used to write several languages of the Ancient Near East. The script was in active use from the early Bronze Age until the beginning of the Common Era. Cuneiform scripts are marked by and named for the characteristic wedge shaped impressions -
1300
Illuminated Manuscript
An illuminated manuscript is a formally prepared document where the text is decorated with flourishes such as borders and miniature illustrations. Often used in the Roman Catholic Church for prayers, liturgical services and psalms, the practice continued into secular texts from the 13th century onward. -
1440
Printing Press
A printing press is a mechanical device for applying pressure to an inked surface resting upon a print medium. It marked a dramatic improvement on earlier printing methods in which the cloth, paper, or other medium was brushed or rubbed repeatedly to achieve the transfer of ink and accelerated the process. Typically used for texts, the invention and global spread of the printing press was one of the most influential events in the second millennium. -
Electrical Telegraph
Electrical telegraphs were point-to-point text messaging systems, primarily used from the 1840s until the late 20th century. It was the first electrical telecommunications system and the most widely used of a number of early messaging systems called telegraphs, that were devised to communicate text messages quicker than physical transportation. Electrical telegraphy can be considered to be the first example of electrical engineering. -
Telephone
The telephone emerged from the making and successive improvements of the electrical telegraph. In 1804, Spanish polymath and scientist Francisco Salva Campillo constructed an electrochemical telegraph. The first working telegraph was built by the English inventor Francis Ronalds in 1816 and used static electricity. An electromagnetic telegraph was created by Baron Schilling in 1832 -
Radio
In an 1864 presentation, published in 1865, James Clerk Maxwell proposed theories of electromagnetism, with mathematical proofs, that showed that light and predicted that radio and x-rays were all types of electromagnetic waves propagating through free space. Between 1886 and 1888 Heinrich Rudolf Hertz published the results of experiments wherein he was able to transmit electromagnetic waves (radio waves) through the air, proving Maxwell's electromagnetic theory. -
Television
Development of television was interrupted by the Second World War. After the end of the war, all-electronic methods of scanning and displaying images became standard. Several different standards for addition of color to transmitted images were developed with different regions using technically incompatible signal standards. Television broadcasting expanded rapidly after World War II, becoming an important mass medium for advertising, propaganda, and entertainment. -
Computer
The first digital electronic calculating machines were developed during World War II. The first semiconductor transistors in the late 1940s were followed by the silicon-based MOSFET (MOS transistor) and monolithic integrated circuit chip technologies in the late 1950s, leading to the microprocessor and the microcomputer revolution in the 1970s -
Internet
Internet service providers (ISPs) emerged in 1989 in the United States and Australia. Limited private connections to parts of the Internet by officially commercial entities emerged in several American cities by late 1989 and 1990. The optical backbone of the NSFNET was decommissioned in 1995, removing the last restrictions on the use of the Internet to carry commercial traffic, as traffic transitioned to optical networks managed by Sprint, MCI and AT&T in the United States. -
Microsoft Xbox Prototype
The Prototype Xbox, also known as the Big X was the first variation of the Xbox to be revealed to the public. The console was used as a showcase unit that would be shown to the press and Microsoft's partners. The consoles disc drive, ventilation and other ports were placed on the back side of the console. Because of the consoles' large size and being made out of a solid block of aluminum, the prototypes reportedly cost $18,000 each to manufacture. -
Microsoft Xbox
The Xbox launched in North America on November 15, 2001. The Xbox runs a custom operating system which is based on a heavily modified version of Windows 2000. It features a media player that can be used to play music CDs, rip CDs to the Xbox's built-in hard drive and play music that has been ripped to the hard drive; it also lets users manage game saves, music, and downloaded content from Xbox Live, and lets Xbox Live users sign in, customize, and manage their account. -
Xbox 360
The Xbox 360 is a home video game console developed by Microsoft. As the successor to the original Xbox, it is the second console in the Xbox series. It competed with Sony's PlayStation 3 and Nintendo's Wii as part of the seventh generation of video game consoles. It was officially unveiled on MTV on May 12, 2005, with detailed launch and game information announced later that month at the 2005 Electronic Entertainment Expo -
Xbox One
The Xbox One is a home video game console developed by Microsoft. Announced in May 2013, it is the successor to Xbox 360 and the third console in the Xbox series. It was first released in North America, parts of Europe, Australia, and South America in November 2013 and in Japan, China, and other European countries in September 2014. It is the first Xbox game console to be released in China -
Xbox One S
On June 13, 2016, during its E3 2016 press conference, Microsoft unveiled Xbox One S, a revision of the original Xbox One hardware with a streamlined form factor and support for HDR10 and 4K video.[76] The Xbox One S replaced the original launch hardware which had been discontinued around the same time. -
Xbox One X
Microsoft also teased a high-end version of Xbox One with upgraded hardware codenamed "Project Scorpio", which was unveiled and released the following year as Xbox One X.[77] After failing to attract interest from game developers and users, Microsoft had also begun to phase out Kinect from the consumer market -
Xbox Series X
The Xbox Series X is the newest edition to the Xbox series. In early 2019, rumors emerged of a fourth generation of Xbox consoles (codenamed "Scarlett") that consisted of a high-end model ("Anaconda") and a lower-end model ("Lockhart"). Microsoft teased Anaconda in June 2019 during E3 2019 and unveiled it as the Xbox Series X during The Game Awards in December. -
Artificial Intelligence
Artificial intelligence (AI) makes it possible for machines to learn from experience, adjust to new inputs and perform human-like tasks. Most AI examples that you hear about today – from chess-playing computers to self-driving cars – rely heavily on deep learning and natural language processing.