1920 – A US Navy F5L seaplane took off from Hampton Roads. Virginia, using a radio compass for the first time. The pilots located and flew to the Battleship Ohio about 94 miles offshore.
1947 – The AK-47 went into production in the Soviet Union – the name stands for Automatic rifle Kalashnikov model of 1947.
1984 – Jack Tramiel Fired Atari Staff
In a very bold move, Jack Tramiel laid off the majority of his staff outside of engineering. This comes in 1984, 3 days after Tramiel buys Atari for $240 million in 10 and 12 year notes.
The employees note that it wasn’t a Hard layoff. One employee stated that no one cared if they looted the building, so they did.
1995 – Simple as 1-2-3: IBM Buys Lotus
IBM completes a $3.5 billion buyout of Lotus Development, the producer of the once-dominant Lotus 1-2-3 to challenge the increasingly demanded Microsoft Excel software, but alas, there was little slowing down the Microsoft juggernaut during the 1990’s. Lotus 1-2-3 steadily lost marketshare, and IBM finally announced the end of support for the software in 2013.
Lotus Notes groupware faired little better than 1-2-3, succumbing to Microsoft Exchange as the dominant groupware platform among large companies, but it is still entrenched among certain corporations today under the name IBM notes.
1996 – America Online Settles Lawsuits
Internet service provider America Online Inc. settles lawsuits filed in California that had accused the company of misleading subscribers about how it computes monthly service charges. As part of the settlement, customers received $22 million in free online time and cash rebates.
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