-
1450 BCE
The City of Ugarit
The city of Ugarit was formed, and they wrote Mesopotamian cuneiform on clay tablets. They also developed a cosmopolitan civilization, along with Aegean, Anatolia, Mesopotamis, and Egypt, and their own alphabetical order -
1200 BCE
Ugarit Fell
The Ugarit branch of the alphabetic family died out after Ugarit fell. -
900 BCE
Matres Lectionis
The Aramaeans introduced the "mothers of reading" in 9th century BC. The mater lectionis was their version of the long vowel, and they became known around the eleventh-tenth centuries BC. -
825 BCE
Carthage
The Carthaginian dialect of the Phoenician script spread all over Europe, and although Carthage was destroyed in 146BC, it was still spoken until the 5th century AD. -
800 BCE
The Diamond Sutra
The oldest printed book dates back to 880BC and it discussed Buddha's opinions. -
500 BCE
Papyrus
The Egyptians invented papyrus in 500BC. -
400 BCE
The First Newsletters Went Out
The first newsletters and subscriptions were sent out by the Romans with the start of their postal service in the 4th century. -
400 BCE
Fall of the Alexandria Library
This library was constructed in the third century, contained 40,000 volumes and was destroyed in the fifth century. It held all historic works, and only a few copies were found in the remains. -
105 BCE
Invention of Paper
The Chinese started to use plant and animal fibers to produce paper; the actual product was invented by Ts'ai Lun. -
350
Christianity Was Introduced in Ethiopia
The Ugarit script was modified to include vowels, be written left to write, and it was used for Semitic languages like Amharic and Tigrinya. -
500
The Turks
The first Altaic people to write back in the sixth century AD. Their oldest inscriptions date back to the eighth century, found in Mongolia. Their script was written from right to left. -
500
Quills
Originally made out of reeds, animal horns, and bones, the quill evolved into a metal pen around AD500. Metal pens were even found in the ruins of Pompeii. -
880
Xylography
The Chinese invented the first printing technology that transferred pictures and text from wood to parchment. -
1050
Phoenicians Altered The Script
The Phoenicians made changes to the script, and now it regularly ran from right to left. They all faced the same direction, and were pushed down to 22. -
1050
Entirety of Europe was Using Paper
There's evidence of manuscripts written on Ts'ai Lun's invention dating back to 1050. -
1400
Quipus
The Incans used quipus to record keep. They were knotted strings that kept track of records, and are similar to the binary system of the common computer. -
1439
Invention of the Printing Press
Invented by Johannes Gutenberg in 1439, it produced a movable type-based printing system. -
1450
42-Line Bible
Gutenberg created his 42-line bible on the printing press. -
1526
The First English Bible
The first English Bible was created by William Tyndale. -
The Concept of the Typewriter
The concept of the typewriter was patented by Henry Mill in 1714. -
The First Electric Typewriter
Thomas Edison patented the first electric typewriter by the end of the 1800s -
Penny Newspapers
The first penny newspapers were released in the 1830s by the New York Sun and the New York Herald. They created news media for the masses that shared stories of a scandalizing or commercial nature. -
Telegraphs
The telegraph was invented to make it possible to communicate over long distances by Morse code, which was created by Samuel B. Morse. -
The Pony Express
With demand for news, the Pony Express was invented, so mailman carried saddlebags of mail to their destinations. The transcontinental railroad was also used to transport mail. -
QWERTY
The first keyboard to have the QWERKY layout was the Sholes and Glidden typewriter. It was sold for $125, and the only flaw was that the user basically typed blindly. -
Invention of the Phone
Alexander Graham Bell invented the first phone, giving people the ability to communicate at long distances. -
The First Fountain Pen
After realizing that the quill's ink was messy, Lewis Edson Waterman invented the first fountain pen. -
The Mimeograph
Invented in 1884, Albert Dick created the first machine that copied documents. -
First Ballpoint Pen (Unsuccessful)
Invented by J.J Loud, this pen could only be used on hard surfaces. -
The Typewriter that Revolutionized Typing
The Underwood Typewriter revolutionized typing. It gave typists more visibility when typing, and it outsold the Sholes typewriter. This typewriter increased demand in office jobs, led to Mark Twains first typed manuscript "Life on the Mississippi," and it led to women having more jobs. -
Invention of the Z1 Computer
Invented by Konrad Zuse, and it was the first functional computer. -
First Successful Ballpoint Pen
Lazlo Josef Biro patented the first ballpoint pen, his name actually became synonymous for ballpoint pen. -
First BIC Pen
Invented by Marcel Bich in 1950, which led to the crystal version in 1958. -
Styalator
The first stylus used on a tablet, invented by Tom Dimond. -
The User-Friendly Xerox
Created by Chester Carlson, the first photocopier was sold in 1959 and revolutionized the copying of the printed page. -
The Typewriter With Magnetic Tape
First typewriter to use magnetic tape that was reusable. -
ProtoCanaanite Deciphered
W.F. Albright deciphered 23 correct phonemic letters of protoCanaanite. Although, people were still skeptical of his deciphering. -
The Dynabook Concept
The Dynabook concept was created and was way before its time. It acted as though it was paper and pencil, an easel, typewriter, and musical instrument in one, but it wasn’t able to be created. -
The First Touchscreen
Touchscreens were invented by Dr. G Samuel Hurst, which led to the idea behind the stylus. -
The First E-book
The Declaration of Independence was the first ebook released during Project Gutenberg. -
Invention of the Cell Phone
Martin Cooper invented the first cell phone in 1973 while working for Motorola. -
Word-Processing and Emailing
Word-processing was in demand, so Microsoft Word, Wordperfect, WordStar and Apple Writer II were created. Also, email was created and the first message was sent using ARPAnet's mail system... the email said "QWERTYUIOP." -
The First Laptop
The first laptop was invented in 1981 and it was called Osborne 1. -
The Grid Compass
The Grid Compass was the next step in the laptop industry, but it was really bulky and ugly. -
E-books on CD-ROMs
The Voyager company released ebooks on CD-ROMs, including Jurassic Park -
Mac's Worst Product
Mac joined the laptop with the first portable Mac computer, called the Macintosh Portable, and it was deemed one of the worst products ever. -
Earliest Samples of Alphabet Found
The earliest samples of alphabetic writing were found in the 1990s in the "Valley of Terror" in Egypt. The scripts contained two inscriptions that dated around 1900-1800BC during Egypt's golden age. -
Personal Digital Assistant
The Personal Digital Assistant, called Apple Newton, was released by Apple and was created to take notes on the go and keep track of events -
Floppy Disks
There were 50 digital books on floppy disk offered by Digital Book Inc. -
The Libretto
Toshiba released their Libretto and it was the first subnotebook ever because it was so small. -
Danielle's Birthday
Danielle was brought into the world on August 18, 1996. -
BlueTooth
Created by five companies: Ericsson, Intel, Nokia, Toshiba, and IBM. It's now possible to transmit things wirelessly. -
Google
Google was found by Larry Page and Sergey Brin. -
First E-book Readers
The first ebook readers were launched (called the rocket ebook) and librarys provided free ebooks for the public through their websites. -
Microsoft's First Tablet
The first Microsoft tablet was released and Bill Gates claimed it had no limits. -
The Amazon Kindle
Amazon Kindle, books were now more available digitally and the kindle made it possible to carry them everywhere. -
iPad, Google, and Amazon
The first iPad was released with iBooks, which sold half a million ebooks in less than a month, then Google ebooks launched, and Amazons ebook sales outnumbered their hardcopy sales. -
Microsoft Surface
Microsoft Surface was released, but is considered more as a tablet than a laptop with an adjustable kickstand and keyboard. -
E-books Took Over
More ebooks were sold than hardcopies for the first time ever. -
First Bluetooth Typewriter Inspired Keyboard
A company called QwerkyToys created the first typewriter-inspired bluetooth keyboard, nearly 150 years after the typewriter was invented. -
The iPencil
The iPencil was released by Apple alongside the iPad Pro; it can be used as though it's an actual pencil. -
The First iPad Pro Was Released
Apple released the first iPad Pro in 2015, it offered more technology than all the other iPads and was compatible with the new iPencil.
