Let's Raise A Glass To The Many Tech Pioneers Who Died In 2016 (slashdot.org) 64
In technology, you're always "standing on the shoulders" of those who came before you -- and together, each individual's contribution becomes part of a larger ongoing story. So as this year finally winds to a close, click through to see our list of some of the pioneers who left us in 2016. And feel free to share any memories and reflections of your own in the comments.
- David Balme, the lieutenant-commander in Britain's royal Navy during World War II who captured one of the Nazi's Enigma encryption device
- Jane Fawcett, one of the British codebreakers who deciphered a crucial Enigma-encoded message
- Erich Bloch, who helped develop the first IBM mainframe
- Intel CEO (and first hire) Andy Grove
- Ray Tomlinson, considered the inventor of email
- John Ellenby, "godfather of the modern laptop"
- Bill Campbell, the legendary tech executive who passed along his advice to Apple's Steve Jobs, Google's Larry Page, and Amazon's Jeff Bezos
- John Glenn, the first American astronaut to orbit the earth
- Joe Sutter, the lead designer on the 747
- Bob Ebeling, one of five engineers who'd forewarned NASA that the Challenger Space Shuttle could explode at liftoff.
- Vera Rubin, the astronomer who helped confirm the existence of dark matter.
- The 'Radioactive Boy Scout', the ambitious teenager whose efforts to build a breeder reactor turned his parents' home in Michigan into an EPA superfund cleanup site.
- Sound designer Jory K. Prum, who worked on more than 120 video games
- David Bunnell, said to have founded more computer magazines than anyone (including PC Magazine and Macworld)
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*quack* *quack* *quack*
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>but you'll never forget Princess Leia.
Because Disney won't let you.
So not all Disney princesses have to spend 20 years in the Vault?
Omission (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Omission (Score:4, Informative)
Also: Jay Forrester and Bob Fano (Score:3)
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No. Andy Grove was actually from the time when people who knew tech led tech.
RIP (Score:5, Insightful)
2016 seems like a year where far too many awesome people died, but it's just the baby boomer curve.
2017 will be much worse.
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He's a 70 year-old baby boomer, though, so here's hoping for a Happy 2017.
If Trump dies, Pence is president. I hope Trump does not die.
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That's funny. Just this afternoon I had to drop a visiting friend off at the George W. Bush Intercontinental Airport here in Houston. When I saw the massive sign I thought to myself, "All things considering, ol' W wasn't all that bad. I may have disagreed with his policies, but at least he wasn't a traitorous rat, in the pocket of an ex-KGB agent."
Happy New Year!
And here, in words direct today fro
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And here, in words direct today from our new Leader, is some V. Putin bromantic fanfic:
https://twitter.com/realDonald... [twitter.com]
Weren't you moved by the warmth of his New Year's Greetings?
Happy New Year to all, including to my many enemies and those who have fought me
and lost so badly they just don't know what to do. Love!
https://twitter.com/realDonald... [twitter.com]
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The size of his ego and the crassness of literally everything he does, is absolutely staggering.
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The size of his ego and the crassness of literally everything he does, is absolutely staggering.
Much as I've always considered him a deplorable human being, he's not the real problem - he didn't elect himself.
The problem are the people who supported his campaign and the voters who elected him
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I agree.
The enablers are the truly despicable shitheels.
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You're right. I just moved down here recently, and I hadn't really thought about it, but IAH is named for Pappy Bush, not Shrub.
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The world will be a better place once we get rid of the boomers.
Seymour Papert, predeceased by (Score:2)
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Once again, you forgot Dave Needle. (Score:1)
From Wikipedia:
David Lewis Needle (1947 – February 20, 2016) was a key engineer and co-chief architect in the creation of the Amiga 1000 computer with Jay Miner, Dave Morse, and RJ Mical. He was one of the main designers and developers of the custom chips of the Amiga computer. Later he co-invented the Atari Lynx and the 3DO Interactive Multiplayer with Dave Morse and RJ Mical.
A 1995 article in Next Generation commented "It's true that of the machines that Mical and Needle have created, only the Amiga has been a true global mass market hit ... But it's only fair to put forward the argument that this is down to the marketing of the machines rather than the quality of the product."
Dave Needle died on February 20, 2016.
They should add, "and the idiots at Slashdot forgot about him."
Seymour Papert (Score:1)
And Slashdot is well and truly dead, judging from (Score:2)