Lecture 2 - A Short History of Computing and the Internet

It seems apparent to me that the history of computing and the Internet could have an entire course dedicated to it. Fortunately, the kind people at the Humanities school in Griffith University decided to only spend one week on the topic for this subject and for that I am grateful. It's not that this topic disinterests me as such, but more that it I find it somewhat difficult to grasp it in its entirety, often leaving me bewildered. Notwithstanding this fact, I have tried my very best to summarise the information that was put in front of me in yesterday's New Communication Technologies lecture and my summary is as follows:

The first computer like inventions stem from a variety of calculating devices which originated in the 19th century. The most prominent of these was Charles Babbage's difference engine. Babbage would then go on to complete the structures of the modern computer but sadly pass away before its completion. Babbage's work would also inspire Ada Byron who would go on help Babbage in his later life and also create the first computer program later in her own life.

Future developments on the modern computer would continue into the twentieth century with the work of Alan Turing who was prominent in the creation of a code breaking device used in World War II. This is now considered the first modern computer.

Despite this groundbreaking development, it was not until the 1950’s that IBM began to manufacture computers for commercial use. At this time computers were extremely large and expensive, only allowing for predominant government usage. It was not until 1975 that the first PC was built. Also around this time, a young Bill Gates started writing BASIC and set up Microsoft. Interestingly, the first developments on the internet began before this in the 1960’s when the US military were developing cold war strategies.

Shortly after this, Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak teamed up to create the computing company Apple. Together they created the first self contained PC and would soon control a vast majority of the computing market. Around this time IBM teamed up Microsoft and entered the PC market, eventually overtaking Apple as the forerunners in the PC market.
The 1990’s saw the rise of the World Wide Web which has gone on to be the main focus of computing from this point on.