Slashdot Mirror
Integrated Circuit Is 50 Years Old Today
arcticstoat writes "Today marks fifty years since the first integrated circuit, or microchip, was demonstrated by Jack Kilby at Texas Instruments on 12 September 1958. The original chip might not be much to look at, but then Texas Instruments admits that Kilby often remarked that if he'd known he'd be showing the first working integrated circuit for the next 40-plus years, he would've 'prettied it up a little.' The integrated circuit itself was housed in a germanium strip on a glass slide, and it measured 7/16in by 1/16in. With protruding wires, and just containing a single transistor, some resistors and a capacitor, it's a primitive chip by today's standards, but it worked and successfully produced a sine wave on an oscilloscope screen at the demo. Technology hasn't been the same since."
Captain Jean-Luc Picard: It's a boyhood fantasy... I must have seen this ship hundreds of times in the Smithsonian but I was never able to touch it.
Lieutenant Commander Data: Sir, does tactile contact alter your perception of the Phoenix?
Captain Jean-Luc Picard: Oh, yes! For humans, touch can connect you to an object in a very personal way, make it seem more real.
[Data also puts his hand on The Phoenix]
Lieutenant Commander Data: I am detecting imperfections in the titanium casing... temperature variations in the fuel manifold... it is no more "real" to me now than it was a moment ago.
Cmdr. Deanna Troi: [observing from a catwalk] Would you three like to be alone?
CS: It is all sink or swim...oh and did I mention there are sharks in that water?