The Magnavox Odyssey is the first commercial home video game console. It
consists of a white, black, and brown box that connects to a television
set, and two controllers attached by wires. It can display three square
dots and one line on the screen in monochrome black and white; players
place plastic overlays on the screen to display additional visual
elements. Ralph H. Baer conceived the console in August 1966 and his
team at Sanders Associates developed it. Magnavox agreed to produce it
in January 1971 and released it in September 1972, selling 69,000
units in its first calendar year and 350,000 by its discontinuation in
1975. A series of lawsuits spanning 20 years, based on patents for the
system and its games by Baer and the other developers, earned Sanders
and Magnavox over US$100 million. Its release marked the beginning of
the first generation of video game consoles and spawned the Odyssey
series, which includes a set of dedicated consoles and the 1978 Magnavox
Odyssey 2.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnavox_Odyssey>
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Today's selected anniversaries:
1942:
World War II: The Imperial Japanese Army began the Battle of
Edson's Ridge in an effort to retake Henderson Field on Guadalcanal in
the Solomon Islands from the Allies.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Edson%27s_Ridge>
1962:
In a speech at Rice Stadium in Houston, U.S. president John F.
Kennedy reiterated an aspiration to land a man on the Moon before 1970.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_choose_to_go_to_the_Moon>
1977:
South African anti-apartheid activist Steve Biko died after
being beaten in police custody in Port Elizabeth.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Biko>
2003:
Typhoon Maemi, the strongest recorded typhoon to strike South
Korea, made landfall near Busan.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Typhoon_Maemi>
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Wiktionary's word of the day:
to a hair:
To a high degree of precision; with the utmost exactness; to a nicety.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/to_a_hair>
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Wikiquote quote of the day:
Man does not create gods, in spite of appearances. The times, the
age, impose them on him. Man can serve his age or rebel against it, but
the target of his cooperation or rebellion comes to him from outside.
--Stanisław Lem
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Stanis%C5%82aw_Lem>
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