Who is credited with inventing the concept of modern personal computeres?
116240
Alan Curtis Kay is considered as the Father of Personal Computing.\n\nFor more info: http://www.sdsuniverse.info/story.asp?id=27397
1053880
While at Harvard, Gates developed a version of the programming language BASIC for the first microcomputer - the MITS Altair\nWhile in high school, he and Paul Allen founded Traf-O-Data, a company which sold traffic flow data systems to state governments. He also helped to create a payroll system in COBOL, for a company in Portland, Oregon.
350338
Mr Bill Gates. Thanks to him, we have modern desk tops Microsoft computers. Many now have them in their homes, and they are now as common-place as Biro pens.
3899
Basic skill in use of computers, from the perspective of such skill being a necessary societal skill.\n\nThe term was coined by Andrew Molnar, while director of the Office of Computing Activities at the National Science Foundation.\n\n"We started computer literacy in '72 [...] We coined that phrase.\n\nIt's sort of ironic.\n\nNobody knows what computer literacy is.\n\nNobody can define it.\n\nAnd the reason we selected [it] was because nobody could define it, and [...] it was a broad enough term that you could get all of these programs together under one roof" (cited in Aspray, W., (September 25, 1991) "Interview with Andrew Molnar," OH 234. Center for the History of Information Processing, Charles Babbage Institute, University of Minnesota).\n\nThe term, as a coinage, is similar to earlier coinages, such as "visual literacy", which Merriam-Webster (http://www.m-w.com/) dates to 1971, and the more recent "media literacy".
356461
I guess u mean who is thr discoverer of computers..well the Father of Computers is Charles Babbage.
283611
I believe the term 'microcomputer' was used EONS ago (back in the 70's and 80's) to distinguish between a computer that filled a room or two and one that had all important components in one box. These days they tend to be called P.C.'s.\nThere was a middle stage, called a 'mini-computer'.\n\nIf you're really interested in this subject (and don't want to get treatment) check out the history of computers. Fascinating stuff (yawn)
67721
huge achievement based on technology in that day
1013622
Inventor of the modern television --> A: Zworykin ...Other people said it was  John Logie Baird
1109161
Bill Gates. His 'empire' is completely devoid of original thinking but they dont hide that they arent creative. They've stolen, bought over and assimilated all features from other OS's and programs in years past... BUT nonetheless, they've dominated. Excelled in all manner of business. Similiar to Steve Jobs but without the extreme eccentricity and non-conformist manner of appealing to the masses. Dell might be the new compaq, shortly. Cheap, barebones performance computers that are loaded down with crippled operating systems and proprietary software.. people dont stay clueless forever, but nonetheless they've become #1 by capitalizing on people's need to have what they believe is the best.. but yet dont know what they're doing.\n\nJeff the Amazon and Pierre of the 'bay.. innovators. Admirable, but not my choice as all-consuming and powerful entrepreneur of all-time. :)
87084
Charles Babbage is credited as the inventor of the first computer due to the invention of his difference engine machine in 1840.
904950
the personal computer (PC) didn't come about until about 1970.  Before that computers where to big and costly to have in the home.  the first programmable did appear until 1941 in germany, and the U.S. didn't develope one until 1948.
520258
1) The Telephone \nThe telephone is an instrument that converts voice and sound signals into electrical impulses for transmission by wire to a different location, where another telephone receives the electrical impulses and turns them back into recognizable sounds. In 1875, Alexander Graham Bell built the first telephone that transmitted electrically the human voice.\n2) The History of Computers\nThere are many major milestones in the history of computers, starting with 1936, when Konrad Zuse built the first freely programmable computer.\n3) Television \nIn 1884, Paul Nipkow sent images over wires using a rotating metal disk technology with 18 lines of resolution. Television then evolved along two paths, mechanical based on Nipkow's rotating disks, and electronic based on the cathode ray tube. American Charles Jenkins and Scotsman John Baird followed the mechanical model while Philo Farnsworth, working independently in San Francisco, and Russian émigré Vladimir Zworkin, working for Westinghouse and later RCA, advanced the electronic model.\n4) The Automobile\nIn 1769, the very first self-propelled road vehicle was invented by French mechanic, Nicolas Joseph Cugnot. However, it was a steam-powered model. In 1885, Karl Benz designed and built the world's first practical automobile to be powered by an internal-combustion engine. In 1885, Gottlieb Daimler took the internal combustion engine a step further and patented what is generally recognized as the prototype of the modern gas engine and later built the world's first four-wheeled motor vehicle.\n5) The Cotton Gin \nEli Whitney patented the cotton gin on March 14, 1794. The cotton gin is a machine that separates seeds, hulls and other unwanted materials from cotton after it has been picked.\n6) The Camera\nIn 1814, Joseph Nicéphore Niépce created the first photographic image with a camera obscura, however, the image required eight hours of light exposure and later faded. Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre is considered the inventor of the first practical process of photography in 1837.\n7) The Steam Engine\nThomas Savery was an English military engineer and inventor who in 1698, patented the first crude steam engine. Thomas Newcomen invented the atmospheric steam engine in 1712. James Watt improved Newcomen's design and invented what is considered the first modern steam engine in 1765.\n8) The Sewing Machine\nThe first functional sewing machine was invented by the French tailor, Barthelemy Thimonnier, in 1830. In 1834, Walter Hunt built America's first (somewhat) successful sewing machine. Elias Howe patented the first lockstitch sewing machine in 1846. Isaac Singer invented the up-and-down motion mechanism. In 1857, James Gibbs patented the first chain-stitch single-thread sewing machine. Helen Augusta Blanchard patented the first zig-zag stitch machine in 1873.\n9) The Light Bulb\nContrary to popular belief, Thomas Alva Edison didn't "invent" the light bulb, but rather he improved upon a 50-year-old idea. In 1809, Humphry Davy, an English chemist, invented the first electric light. In 1878, Sir Joseph Wilson Swan, an English physicist, was the first person to invent a practical and longer-lasting electic lightbulb (13.5 hours) with a carbon fiber filament. In 1879, Thomas Alva Edison invented a carbon filament that burned for forty hours.\n10) Penicillin \nPenicillin was discovered by Alexander Fleming in 1928. Andrew Moyer patented the first method of industrial production of penicillin in 1948.
428697
Charles Babbage -Father of computer.\nAugustus Ada King- Mother of programming
731853
Here's an interesting page about early PC's. Keep scrolling down when the page opens.  It's rather interesting. \nhttp://www.blinkenlights.com/pc.shtml\n\nAnd, here's Wiki's entry:\nhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_computing_hardware
938743
i suppose it depends on what you are looking for as a definition of computer.\n\nYou could say the abacus.\nOr if you're looking for something programmable then in 1801 Joseph Jacquard developed a weaving loom whose weaving process was based on holes punched in a card.\nHerman Hollerith used a hole punch card to speed up census tabulation for the 1890 US census - which led to the creation of IBM\n\nBut these wer all based on inventions that used gears to represent data invented by Blaise Pascal (1623-1662)  Gottfried Leibniz (1646-1716) and Charles Babbage (1792-1871)\n\nAugusta Ada Byron, Countess of Lovelace is accredited as being the first programmer in regards to charles babbage's analytical engine during the mid to late 1830's.\n\nHope this information helps
645059
Leibniz may have been the first computer scientist and information theorist. Early in life, he discovered the binary number system (base 2), the one subsequently employed on all computers, then revisited that system throughout his career. On Leibniz and binary numbers, see Couturat (1901: 473-78). Leibniz anticipated Lagrangian interpolation and algorithmic information theory. His calculus ratiocinator anticipated aspects of the universal Turing machine. In 1934, Norbert Wiener claimed to have found in Leibniz's writings a mention of the concept of feedback, central to Wiener's later cybernetic theory.\n\nIn 1671, Leibniz began to invent a machine that could execute all four arithmetical operations, gradually improving it over a number of years. This machine attracted fair attention and was the basis of his election to the Royal Society in 1673. A number of such machines were made during his years in Hanover, by a craftsman working under Leibniz's supervision. It was not an unambiguous success because it did not fully mechanize the operation of carrying. Couturat (1901: 115) reported finding an unpublished note by Leibniz, dated 1674, describing a machine capable of performing some algebraic operations.\n\nLeibniz was groping towards hardware and software concepts worked out much later by Charles Babbage and Ada Lovelace, 1830-45. In 1679, while mulling over his binary arithmetic, Leibniz imagined a machine in which binary numbers were represented by marbles, governed by a rudimentary sort of punched cards.[2] Modern electronic digital computers replace Leibniz's marbles moving by gravity with shift registers, voltage gradients, and pulses of electrons, but otherwise they run roughly as Leibniz envisioned in 1679. Davis (2000) discusses Leibniz's prophetic role in the emergence of calculating machines and of formal languages.
234267
In the March, 1974, issue of QST magazine there appeared the first advertisement for a "personal computer." It was called the Scelbi (SCientific, ELectronic and BIological) and designed by the Scelbi Computer Consulting Company of Milford, Connecticut. Based on Intel's 8008 microprocessor, Scelbi sold for $565 and came with 1K of programmable memory, with an additional 15K of memory available for $2760. The second "personal computer kit" was the Mark-8 (also Intel 8008 based) designed by Jonathan Titus.\n--------------------------\nIn 1977, Radio Shack introduced its TRS-80 microcomputer, also nicknamed the "Trash-80". It was based on the Zilog Z80 processor (an 8-bit microprocessor whose instruction set is a superset of the Intel 8080)\n-----------------------------\nPersonal note... I was among the first users of the TRS-80, using it with my ham radio hobby for generation and decoding Morse code and radio teletype.