Microsoft likes doing things in pairs, which is why they’re on the verge of releasing this Wireless Laser Keyboard 7000 to go along with the Wireless Laser Mouse 7000 they announced a few weeks ago. It’s pretty similar to other Microsoft ergonomic keyboards, except there’s a neat glass frame around the edge of the entire board, along with a dedicated Flip 3D key (next to the ALT key to the right of the Space). If this feels as good as MS’s older ergo-keyboards, we’re in for three. [I Started Something]

Via [Gizmodo]

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As of today, the analog cellphone is no more. Here’s the complete timeline of its development, since Greece in 490BC to February 18, 2008, the day in which networks are no longer obligated to provide with analog cellphone coverage. Click to see the big, high definition version.

(Click the image above for a huge 2000-pixel wide version of the timeline)

490 BC
Pheidippides ran from Marathon to Athens to transmit the news of the victory over the Persians.
Signal was really bad back then: he died on the spot after delivering the message, according to Plutarch.

1876
First successful telephone transmission. Graham Bell says “Mr. Watson, come here, I want to see you” and Watson comprehends each word clearly. A century later, people would be “What? State that again? Watson? Watson?” over cellphone lines.

1895
Marconi puts Tesla wireless communications discoveries to practice, developes commercial radio.

1906
Reginald Aubrey Fessenden demonstrates first wireless radio telephone.

1908
First US Patent on a wireless phone awarded to Nathan B. Stubblefield.

1926
Radio telephony starts to be used in the First Class of the Hamburg-Berlin train line.

1939
World War II starts. Germans begin using radio phones in tanks on a large scale.

1945
Germany surrenders. Hitler kills himself, he never used a Windows Mobile Phone, (or a Playstation 3 or a HD DVD player.)

1947
Bell Labs proposes hexagonal cells for mobile phones, with the three sided antenna we know today. It sucked, because it was all theoretical.

1954
Linus Larrabee (Humphrey Bogart) uses a real mobile phone from his automobile in Billy Wilder’s Sabrina (played by Audrey Hepburn.)

1956
First fully automatic mobile phone (Mobiltelefonisystem A or MTA) system launched in Sweden by Ericsson. Each handset, pictured above, was 90 pounds (40 kg.)

1965
Ericsson’s MTB is launched. This time, the headset is just 20 pounds (9 kg.) thanks to the use of transistors.

1970
Automatic “call handoff” system is invented, allowing mobile phones to move through several cell areas during a single conversation without loss of conversation.

1971
ARP, the first successful commercial cellphone network, is launched in Finland. You couldn’t move from cell to cell seamlessly.
It was 0G (Zero G.)

1973
April 3, 1973: Motorola’s Dr. Martin Cooper calls Joel Engel, head of research at AT&T’s Bell Labs, while walking in New York City using the first Motorola DynaTAC prototype. The beginning of 1G networks.

1978
Bell launches first trial commercial cellular network in Chicago.

1982
Nokia introduces their first cellphone, the analog Mobira Senator. FCC approves the analog-based Advanced Mobile Phone Service (AMPS) and assigns frequencies in the 824-894 MHz band.

1983
Motorola DynaTAC 8000X is the first commercial cellphone available in the US.MTB shuts down, still with 600 clients.

1990
FCC approves the Digital AMPS, the beginning of the end for analog networks.

1991
First commercial GSM call in the world. Done using Nokia hardware. 2G and digital begins.

1993
txt msgng apprs 4 1st time LOL.

1996
Motorola StarTAC debuts.

2000
3G appears.

2002
FCC decides to close down the analog network

2003
GPRS and EDGE, technologies for faster (but not too fast) data transfers, launch. It’s 2.5G. 3G networks are not available yet.

2007
iPhone launches. Still runs on 2.5G technology, but adds Wi-Fi for data transfer. 3G cellphones begin to become ubiquitous.

2008
February 19
Cellphone analog networks can shut down

[Wikipedia, Nokia, Ericsson, Motorola and various other sources]

For other gadgety Giz timelines, click here.

Via [Gizmodo]

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If you have a burning desire to surf the internets on your TV with Apple TV and its crappy tiny remote, Safari HD has you covered. It’s actually a native Apple TV browser coded with the WebKit rendering engine, and it supports Flash plus anything else Safari can handle. After downloading the installer, you’ve gotta open an SSH connection and do a minor bit of command mojo, but it’s easy enough for even the nubbiest noob. And Television net browsing is pretty nubby. [Brandon Holland via Apple Television Hacks]

Via [Gizmodo]

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Apart from bringing us laws, wars, peace, hanging chads, lobbies, sex scandals, First Ladies and Rough Riders, there have been presidents and Founding Dads who have brought us all kinds of gadgets and inventions. Jump to see the ideal tech that the fearless leaders of the free world had to offer us.

Thomas Jefferson, the man who wrote the Declaration of Independence, also brought us the automatic door, swivel chair and designed the first ever macaroni machine. Ben Franklin, while never president, is definitely the geeks’ choice for the man who never was but should have been—I mean, faced with he or Al Gore, who would you vote for?—was even more prolific. Blame him for bifocals, lightning rods, glass harmonicas and the odometer, that little counter that racks up your car’s mileage, even though Franklin’s version was designed for carriages.

Finally, we’ve President Lincoln, the only US President to have obtained a patent, for a device to lift boats over schoals, after a couple of incidents when traveling by boat, first in 1831, and then in 1848, while traveling home from Congress. The patent application reads: “Be it known that I, Abraham Lincoln, of Springfield, in the county of Sangamon, in the state of Illinois, have invented a new and improved manner of combining adjustable buoyant air chambers with a steam boat or other vessel for the purpose of enabling their draught of water to be readily lessened to enable them to pass over bars, or through shallow water, without discharging their cargoes.” Babraham’s design never saw the light of day, however. [Wikipedia]

Via [Gizmodo]

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