Archive for August 2025
First San Francisco Cable Car
August 2, 1873
The Clay Street Railroad begins operation, making it the first cable car in San Francisco’s now famous cable car system.
The Final End of the Lisa
August 1, 1986
Apple discontinues production of the Macintosh XL, effectively ending the life of the Apple Lisa computer platform. In January of 1985, the Macintosh line of computers was gaining momentum but the Lisa line of computers was not selling well. In order to salvage what they could from the Lisa and offer a more powerful Macintosh computer, Apple created the Macintosh XL model by modifying a Lisa 2/10 computer to run the Macintosh operating system. Apple discontinued the Lisa in April of 1985, but continued production of the hybrid Lisa/Mac Macintosh XL until this date.
Video Killed the Radio Star; MTV Debuts
August 1, 1981
MTV, presumably standing for “Music Television”, launches on cable TV. As most people know, after the introduction sequence, the first video played was “Video Killed the Radio Star” by The Buggles. However, a bit of trivia is that the second song played was “You Better Run” by Pat Benatar. MTV had an immediate impact on the music industry and was an iconic symbol of the technology-driven 1980’s.