Technological Progression During 1900-Today

There has been a lot of technological progression throughout the years. The technological progression during 1900-1959 and 1960-today, which is better? That is a loaded question, but obviously the 1900-1959 era has had a lot more progression. For example, the tv, “Few inventions have had as much effect on contemporary American society as television” (History of Television). The first electronic tv was demonstrated in San Francisco on Sept. 7, 1927, it was created by Philo Taylor Farnsworth, a 21-year-old inventor. He had lived without electricity until the age of fourteen. In 1939 a 5in console TV was $295 (or ~$5000 in current money), it was the size of a drinks cabinet. The television was one of, if not the, most popular products of the

and saw many technological advances. One advancement is the widespread use of telephones in american homes and businesses. “By the 1950s, roughly two-thirds of American households had at least one telephone, with the percentage growing every year” (Fredman). Back then people only had one phone in the entire house, and they did not own it, it was rented from AT&T. The phones had a rotary dial on the front, since keypads had not been implemented yet. “ The dial had 10 finger holes in it, corresponding to the digits 1 through 9 and zero” (Fredman). By the end of the decade, almost all of the remaining manual local phone exchanges (this requires a human operator to connect a call.) had been replaced by an automated system. The 1950s was also the birth of direct distance dialing, this allowed callers to directly call long distance without an intermediary. After some years telephones got keypads, then became wireless, and eventually evolved into cell phones. The early cell phones, pre 1983, were considered car phones because they were to big and bulky to be carried on oneself. In 1983 the Motorola DynaTAC 8000x was introduced to the world, although it is huge by today’s standards, it was truly the first “mobile phone” because it was small enough to carry. “ The phone, though incredibly expensive, became a pop culture symbol, showing up on everyone from Gordon Gekko in the movie Wall Street, to high school heartbreaker, Zack Morris, in

It is considered to be the first really functional modern computer. Konrad also finishes and distributes the Z4 in July, 1950, becoming the first commercial computer. Also in 1950 “The United States Government receives the UNIVAC 1101 or ERA 1101. This computer is considered to be the first computer that was capable of storing and running a program from memory” (Computer History for 1950). This computer was the base for all of the current computers, and those that will come after. One huge invention to aid the computer is the CPU, or central processing unit, this is the part people often call the “brain” of the computer. They are wrong, the CPU is not the brain, it is literally the part that does the computing. “Every command you send to your computer — whether it’s a key press, a mouse click or a complicated command line instruction — is converted into binary and sent to the CPU to be dealt with” (Guinness). A CPU has billions of transistors, a transistor is a device that regulates current or voltage flow and acts as a switch or gate for electronic signals. These are the foundation of everything the CPU does. “Through the work of thousands of intelligent scientists and engineers, this network of microscopic electronics gives rise to the operating system and web browser you are using to view this post. The power of a CPU is roughly dependant on the number of