Media History Timeline: 1970s

20th Century:Eighth Decade

Gallery

Ms. magazine
1972

Pong
1972

1975

Richard Estes's
Cafe Express,
1975

IBM portable
computer
1975

Commodore PET,
late 1970s

Fiber optics
1977

Apple II, used floppy
disc, 1977

VisiCalc spreadsheet
1979

1970-1979


1970: 1970: Heller, Good As Gold, a novel examining a man's self-loathing, obsession.; 1970: On Broadway, Jesus Christ Superstar.; 1970: Germaine Greer's The Female Eunuch, adds to feminist literature.; 1970: The Protestant New English Bible and the Catholic New American Bible.; 1970: Big Bird of Sesame Street gets a Time cover.; 1970: Bar codes.; 1970: Postal Reform Bill makes U.S. Postal Service self-supporting.; 1970: Corning Glass Works spins out optical fiber clear enough for light pulses.; 1970: Kate Millet's Sexual Politics stirs feminist thinking.; 1970: In Germany, a videodisc is demonstrated.; 1970: IBM System 370 allows time-sharing, online computing.; 1970: 55% of American adults complete high school; slightly more females.; 1970: Eudora Welty's novel Losing Battles imagines two days in a Mississippi town.; 1970: A new kind of communication: barcodes.; 1970: Alohanet, first wireless computer networking system, University of Hawaii.; 1970: Improved Picturephone commercial service begins in downtown Pittsburgh.; 1970: U.S. Post Office and Western Union offer Mailgrams.; 1970: Controversial Japanese author Yukio Mishima commits ritual suicide.; 1970: Oscars: Patton, George C. Scott (refuses Oscar), Glenda Jackson.; 1970: Also at the movies: Five Easy Pieces, Love Story, Airport, M*A*S*H.; 1970: Foreign language film Oscar: Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion, Italy; 1970: Mr. Sammler's Planet wins Saul Bellow another National Book Award.; 1970: FM stations target population segments, introducing "narrowcasting".; 1970: Mini-Moog synthesizers sold to touring rock bands.; 1970: Some FM stations offer stereophonic music.; 1970: FCC forces television networks out of syndication business with "Fin-Syn" rules.; 1970: U.S. movie tickets drop from 3 billion plus in 1950 to under 1 billion.; 1970: AP sends news by computer.; 1970: U.S. Postal Reorganization Act puts postal service on an independent track.; 1970: Nobel Prize in Literature: Russian novelist Alexander Solzhenitsyn.; 1970: Film Jane Eyre made with Dolby A-type noise reduction.; 1970: Canadian filmmakers invent giant projector IMAX system.

1971: 1971: Nobel Prize in Literature: Pablo Neruda, Chilean poet.; 1971: Software patent issued for computerized telephone switching system.; 1971: Newspapers switch from hot metal letterpress to offset.; 1971: Email.; 1971: Steve Wozniak, Bill Fernandez build "cream soda" computer from junk parts.; 1971: National Science Foundation begins two-year videotex test.; 1971: ARPANET, Internet forerunner, has 22 university, government connections.; 1971: Project Gutenberg starts to enter great documents, literature online.; 1971: Herman Wouk's, The Winds of War is a best-seller, will become a mini-series.; 1971: Intel builds the 4004 microprocessor, "a computer on a chip."
1971: The Pascal programming language.: 1971: Oscars: The French Connection, Gene Hackman, Jane Fonda.; 1971: Also at the movies: Klute, The Last Picture Show, Fiddler on the Roof.; 1971: Foreign language film Oscar: The Garden of the Finzi-Continis, Italy.; 1971: World swallows hoax of primitive Philippine Tasaday tribe cave dwellers.; 1971: Wang 1200 is the first word processor.; 1971: Texas Instruments sells a popular portable electronic calculator.; 1971: Cellphone is invented.; 1971: New York Times publishes "The Pentagon Papers."; 1971: American television grows more socially conscious with All in the Family.; 1971: In Washington, D.C., the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts opens.; 1971: John Rawls, A Theory of Justice, seminal work in modern philosophy.; 1971: Elizabeth Janeway, Man's World, Woman's Place.; 1971: Jerzy Kosinski's satire on television viewing, Being There.

1972: 1972: Ms. magazine.; 1972: In Philippines, Marcos' martial law throttles one of Asia's freest presses.; 1972: Pong, first home video game, in first game console, the Magnavox Odyssey..; 1972: C, a programming language for the Unix operating system.; 1972: Sony sells a videotape system for the home, the Betamax.; 1972: Historian Daniel Boorstin publishes the first of his 3-volume The Americans.; 1972: European manufacturers (Decca, Philips, AEG) bring out the video disc.; 1972: A satellite is used for live television transmission.; 1972: Public demonstration of ARPANET.; 1972: HBO starts pay-TV service for cable.; 1972: New FCC rules lead to community access channels.; 1972: Polaroid camera can focus by itself.; 1972: Digital television comes out of the lab.; 1972: Movie Deep Throat starts porn industry explosion.; 1972: The BBC offers Ceefax, two-way cable information system.; 1972: "Open Skies": any U.S. firm can have communication satellites.; 1972: Landsat I, "eye-in-the-sky" satellite, is launched.; 1972: Nobel Prize in Literature: German novelist Heinrich Bšll.; 1972: The Phillips laserdisc; it plays but can't record.; 1972: Philadelphia Inquirer builds a computer database for a news story.; 1972: Satellites used for television news reports.; 1972: Oscars: The Godfather, Marlon Brando, Liza Minelli.; 1972: Also at the movies: Cabaret, Deliverance, The Poseidon Adventure.; 1972: Foreign language film Oscar: The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie, France.; 1972: Sony's Port-a-Pak, a much more portable video recorder.; 1972: From Canada, a programmable word processor with a video screen, the AES 90.; 1972: The Xerox Alto, first computer with a mouse and a graphical interface.; 1972: Washington Post begins Watergate reporting that will bring down president.; 1972: The Godfather sets box office record of $1 million a day for first month.; 1972: FCC ends six-year ban on installing cable TV in large cities.
: 1973; 1973: Nobel Prize in Literature: Australian novelist Patrick White.; 1973: Burr, best-selling historical novel by Gore Vidal.; 1973: $575 buys you a computer kit with a micrprocessor, the Scelbi-8H.; 1973: George Carlin's "Seven dirty words" results in court slap for Pacifica Radio.; 1973: Starting in Columbus, OH, TV cable homes get identifiable addresses.; 1973: Oscars: The Sting, Jack Lemmon, Glenda Jackson.; 1973: Also at the movies: The Exorcist, Last Tango in Paris, American Graffiti.; 1973: Playgirl gives women the eye candy men get from Playboy.; 1973: George Carlin's "Seven dirty words" results in court slap for Pacifica Radio.; 1973: Starting in Columbus, OH, TV cable homes get identifiable addresses.; 1973: Foreign language film Oscar: Day for Night, France.; 1973: Non-compatible video player formats lead several manufacturers to fail.; 1973: IBM's Selectric typewriter is now "self-correcting."; 1973: Vonnegut writes more dark humor, Breakfast of Champions.; 1973: Erica Jong shocks with her language, Fear of Flying.; 1973: Complex Thomas Pynchon novel, Gravity's Rainbow wins National Book Award.; 1973: Fairchild builds an image-forming CCD chip, 100 rows x 100 columns.; 1973: Xerox sets up a LAN (local area network) called Ethernet.; 1973: Super 8 home movie cameras with magnetic striping for sound.; 1973: Watergate exposure by press will lead to Nixon resignation next year.; 1973: Reggae music spreads out from Jamaica.; 1973: AP plans to store news photos in its computers.; 1973: Computer in England, another in Norway connect to ARPANET.; 1973: An American family, the Louds, comes apart on national television.; 1973: People magazine steps out.; 1973: AP, UPI start to install computer terminals in all U.S. bureaus.

1974: 1974: Carrie is the first of Stephen King's blockbuster gothic novels.; 1974: Robert Pirsig's oddly titled novel, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.; 1974: In England, the BBC transmits Teletext data to TV sets.; 1974: Coaxial cable can carry 108,000 phone conversations at the same time.; 1974: Electronic News Gathering (ENG).; 1974: Telephone "hot line" is set up between the White House and the Kremlin.; 1974: Arcade video game Tank uses ROM chips to store graphics.; 1974: International digital voice transmission.; 1974: Satellite transmission of mailgrams.; 1974: Punk rock music emerges in Britain, with themes of nihilism, anarchy.; 1974: Wall Street Journal successfully transmits an edition by satellite.; 1974: Nobel Prize in Literature: Swedish novelists Eyvind Johnson, Harry Martinson.; 1974: Telnet offers commercial packet data service.; 1974: James Michener, Centennial, a fictional account of a Colorado town.; 1974: Heinrich Bšll, The Lost Honor of Katharina Blum.; 1974: Magazine article on $439 Altair kit inspires many computer hobbyists.; 1974: In Japan, Yukio Mishima's The Sea of Fertility tetralogy published after death.; 1974: Oscars: The Godfather, Part II, Art Carney, Ellen Burstyn.; 1974: Also at the movies: The Towering Inferno, Chinatown, Blazing Saddles.; 1974: Foreign language film Oscar: Amarcord, Italy.; 1974: U.S. newspapers start to replace reporters' typewriters with terminals.; 1974: "Teacher-in-the-Sky" satellite begins educational mission.; 1974: The word "Internet" enters the lexicon.; 1974: Dolby Labs demonstrates Surround Sound and Pro Logic for movies.

1975: 1975: Philips demonstrates an optical videodisc system.; 1975: The microcomputer, in kit form, reaches the U.S. home market.; 1975: Gunfight, an arcade video game for two players, uses a micrprocessor.; 1975: IBM portable computer, 50 lbs., cost $9,000 for 16K, $20,000 for 64K machines.; 1975: Oscars: One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Jack Nicholson, Louise Fletcher.; 1975: Also at the movies: Jaws, Nashville, Funny Lady, Dog Day Afternoon.; 1975: Steven Spielberg's Jaws will be the first film to earn more than $100 million.; 1975: In Maine, the last manual telephone company switchboard is put away.; 1975: Foreign language film Oscar: Dersu Uzala, U.S.S.R.; 1975: Last manual telephone switchboard in Maine is retired.; 1975: Peter Singer's Animal Liberation informs public of inhumane treatment.; 1975: Feature film, Lisztomania has Dolby Stereo optical soundtrack.; 1975: HBO's "Thrilla' from Manila," nationwide by satellite, begins pay cable boom.; 1975: Substantial entertainment production for cable channels.; 1975: Playwright David Mamet, American Buffalo.; 1975: BASIC becomes the first programming language for the personal computer.; 1975: Bill Gates and Paul Allen start a company they call Micro-Soft.; 1975: Frances Lappé's Diet for a Small Planet opposes meat, sells 1.5 million copies.; 1975: Venera 9 sends pictures of the surface of Venus.; 1975: In Los Angeles, the first computer store; it sells assembled computers.; 1975: Nobel Prize in Literature: poet Eugenio Montale, Italy; 1975: Saul Bellow's comic novel Humboldt's Gift wins Pulitzer Prize.; 1975: On television, Saturday Night Live.; 1975: New Yorkers read Reuters news via teletext and videotex on cable.; 1975: In France, a test of the Antiope text-only teletext service via TV signals.; 1975: E.L. Doctorow's historical novel, Ragtime; will become 1998 Broadway musical.; 1975: U.S. television networks agree to set a "family hour" free of sex and violence.; 1975: Tom Wolfe writes about the astronauts, The Right Stuff.

1976: 1976: Alex Haley's search for his ancestors is published as Roots.; 1976: Nobel Prize in Literature: American novelist Saul Bellow.; 1976: The Apple I. Steve Jobs sells his VW van to raise manufacturing funds.; 1976: Queen Elizabeth II is the first head of state to send an email message.; 1976: The Cray-1 supercomputer can do 240 million calculations per second.; 1976: Small satellite dishes go into residential backyards.; 1976: On Broadway, Evita.; 1976: "Electric Pencil," the first popular microcomputer word-processing program.; 1976: Dolby stereo goes into movie theaters.; 1976: Ethernet invented to speed data over coaxial cable.; 1976: Court rules that "family hour" on television is unconstitutional.; 1976: U.S. Copyright Act extends protection to 50 years.; 1976: Viking II sends color photos from Mars.; 1976: Trials begin on TCP/IP protocol for Internet.; 1976: Apple computer founders design popular video game Breakout.; 1976: Ted Turner delivers programming nationwide by satellite.; 1976: Sony's Betamax and JVC's VHS battle for home market. Sony will lose.; 1976: Steadicam, a camera stabilizing system,; 1976: Oscars: Rocky, Peter Finch, Faye Dunaway.; 1976: Also at the movies: Network, All the President's Men, Taxi Driver.; 1976: FCC reserves line 21 on television sets for closed captions.; 1976: Barbara Walters is the first woman to anchor a U.S.,network newscast.; 1976: Foreign language film Oscar: Black and White in Color, Ivory Coast.; 1976: A still camera, Canon AE-1, uses a microprocessor.; 1976: U.S. Copyright Act revison considers photocopying, fair use, interlibrary loans.

1977: 1977: Columbus, Ohio, residents try 2-way cable experiment, QUBE.; 1977: Oscars: Annie Hall, Richard Dreyfuss, Diane Keaton.; 1977: Also at the movies: Star Wars, Saturday Night Fever, Looking for Mr. Goodbar.; 1977: Foreign language film Oscar: Madame Rosa, France.; 1977: Star Wars released in 46 theaters equipped with Dolby Stereo.; 1977: MCI ends AT&T exclusivity for long distance phone service.; 1977: Chicago gets commercial fiber-optic communications.; 1977: Apple II's floppy disk drive leads to writing of many software programs.; 1977: Atari introduces a programmable home video game system in a cartridge. >; 1977: The Apple II microcomputer is a best seller. Also: Commodore Pet, TRS-80.; 1977: Nobel Prize in Literature: Spanish poet Vicente Aleixandre.; 1977: Disco music becomes the rage.; 1977: John Cheever's novel, Falconer.; 1977: Toronto Globe and Mail offers public access to newspaper text database.; 1977: An electronic mail system is developed at the University of Wisconsin.; 1977: As a TV miniseries, Roots draws 130 million viewers over 8 nights.; 1977: Stephen King's novel, The Shining, like Carrie, will become a hit movie.; 1977: Nintendo begins to sell computer games.; 1977: In Chicago, AT&T transmits telephone calls by fiber optics.

1978: 1978: RCA introduces the Selectavision video disc.; 1978: John Irving's novel, The World According to Garp.; 1978: Another Michener novel , Chesapeake, Maryland history, fiction across time.; 1978: Louise Brown, the first test tube baby, born outside the womb.; 1978: From Japan's Konica, the point-and-shoot, autofocus camera.; 1978: BBS (Bulletin Board Software) lets computers communicate via phone modems.; 1978: First tests of cellular telephones.; 1978: Cellular radio gets spectrum allocated to cable channels 70 to 83.; 1978: Space Invaders, the first video game to reach mainstream public.; 1978: Atari's arcade game Football introduces video sports.; 1978: In England, the start of a videotex and teletext system called Oracle.; 1978: A nove of graphicsl, A Contract with God, by Will Eisner is published.; 1978: Nobel Prize in Literature: Jewish short story writer Isaac Bashevis Singer.; 1978: Broadcasting finds many uses for computers.; 1978: Will Eisner’s A Contract with God is the first graphic novel.; 1978: In Japan, the Captain videotex service begins public tests.; 1978: Intel offers a 16-bit microprocessor.; 1978: Toni Morrison's novel, Song of Solomon.; 1978: PBS goes to satellite for delivery, abandoning telephone lines.; 1978: Oscars: The Deer Hunter, Jon Voight, Jane Fonda.; 1978: Also at the movies: Coming Home, Superman, Midnight Express, The Wiz.; 1978: Foreign language film Oscar: Get Out Your Handkerchiefs, France.; 1978: Herman Wouk's War and Remembrance, a best-seller, will be another mini-series.; 1978: Electronic typewriters go on sale.; 1978: Games like Space Invaders draw teenagers to arcades.

1979: 1979: Speech recognition machine has a vocabulary of 1,000 words.; 1979: News groups arrive on the Internet.; 1979: Prestel videotex provides data by television on command in England.; 1979: Rap music goes beyond the streets of New York.; 1979: From England, a text-only Multi-User Dungeon (MUD) game.; 1979: Game players discover the Internet, especially multi-user potential.; 1979: From Holland comes the digital videodisc read by laser.; 1979: On Broadway, a Sondheim musical, Sweeney Todd.; 1979: Atari's Lunar Lander arcade game originally designed for space program.; 1979: Canada tests Telidon videotex.; 1979: WordStar, an early, successful word processing program.; 1979: In Japan, first cellphone network.; 1979: Atari 400 and 800 model game computers.; 1979: V.S. Naipaul, A Bend in the River, questions accuracy of history.; 1979: Sony's Betascan shows picture in fast forward mode.; 1979: A spreadsheet program, VisiCalc, turns small businesses on to computers.; 1979: Nobel Prize in Literature: Greek poet Elytis Odysseus.; 1979: Motorola's 68.000 microprocessor contains 68,000 transistors.; 1979: Oscars: Kramer vs. Kramer, Dustin Hoffman, Sally Field.; 1979: Also at the movies: Apocalypse Now, Norma Rae, All That Jazz, The Black Stallion.; 1979: Foreign language film Oscar: The Tin Drum, West Germany.; 1979: Computerized laser printing is a boon to Chinese printers.; 1979: William Styron's, Sophie's Choice, a horrific novel of Nazi atrocity.; 1979: Sony Walkman tape player starts a fad.; 1979: CompuServe comes online.; 1979: USENET begins.