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The History Of Technology In The 1980s

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Ever tried to live without the internet? How about your computer or even your cell phone? Before the 1980s it was not hard to live without them, for this technology had yet to be invented. Our technology keeps improving each year. Since the 1980s, we now have cell phones that are small and can fit inside our pockets; we have computers and the internet that will have an answer, whether false or true, to almost anything. We have smart boards, flat screen TVs, iPads, ear phones, and so much more technology, which we would not have had without the events that happened in the 1980s.
January 28, 1986 at about 11:38 A.M. seven people lost their lives on the space shuttle challenger, including McAuliffe, who was the first civilian in space. It took …show more content…
It all started when television audiences for space launches fell to record lows which caused complications for NASA. They later determined to capture the country's attention by simply having a series of launches for all to witness. Interest in the Space programs increased throughout America when the space shuttle, challenger, carried Dr. Sally Ride, the first American woman to fly to space, on April 1983. Then once again in August 1983, when the first African American, Guion S. Bluford Jr. flew to space on the challenger (Kallen 100-101). January 28, 1986, crew included Judith A. Resnik, the second American woman in space, and Christa McAuliffe, a schoolteacher in New Hampshire. The flight was going smoothly up until they reached an altitude of 47,000 feet and were going 1,977 miles per hour when the challenger was annihilated. The whole nation was in shock. Five days after the …show more content…
Based on that idea, computers were becoming closer to being invented and soon we had personal computers. Personal computers were made in 1975 by a small firm, in which they labeled computer, the Altair 8800, but was soon abandoned. Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, both whom were college dropouts, dominated the computer world in 1980. They were the ones who established the Apple Computer Company in 1976; by 1984 the company had become a billion-dollar company. The first personal computer happens to be the Apple II, which it sold in the millions. Prices for computers dropped dramatically as more people bought these computers, it got to as low as 1,000. Not only did people have them in their houses, but even schools had them to teach children in computer use, which made Apples the first machine to be used in schools (Stuart 96-97). Although the computer was an amazing invention, they didn't stop there, the internet was introduced in the 80s. Although the internet started in the early 70s, it was implemented to support military communications. Then the internet was only accessed by the military, government employees, and university research departments in the beginning of the 80s. The Natural Science Foundation (NSF) created five very expensive regional supercomputer centers in the late 1980s to make

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