Early public encounters with computers were shaped less by direct use than by description and explanation. Long before laptops and smartphones became common, print media helped bring the technology to ...
C. 2500 BCE: Sumerian abacus -- c. 700 BC: Scytale -- c. 150: Antikythera mechanism -- c. 60: Programmable robot -- c. 850: "On Deciphering Cryptographic Messages ...
The first electronic computer was built during the 1940s by John Vincent Atanasoff, a professor of physics and mathematics at Iowa State University, and one of his students, Clifford E. Berry. But the ...
If you buy something from a Verge link, Vox Media may earn a commission. See our ethics statement. Technology craves a narrative but often has a short memory for history. As a publication that ...