ALL of the reading material in the vast Library of Congress may be housed in a few small filing cabinets! To anyone who has seen the thousands of massive volumes in this great building, such a statement seems fantastic. But it remains a fact. Through recent developments in microphotography and the perfection of a new type of micro-grain film, the contents of two 10×15 inch pages can be reduced 400 times to occupy but three-fourths of a square inch of film.
Der Münchner Germanist Theo Vennemann glaubt, den Ursprung der germanischen Schrift gefunden zu haben – sie kam mit den Phöniziern in den Norden. Von Wolfgang Krischke
DIE ZEIT, 22.02.2007 Nr. 09
Nur ein Prozent aller Schriften der Griechen, Römer und Ägypter soll die Zeiten überdauert haben. Bis heute suchen Forscher nach den Überresten der Bibliothek von Alexandria - und in Papyrusfragmenten nach Gedanken aus einer vergangenen Welt.
Das Internet hat viele Väter. Deswegen hat das Internet nicht erst seit heute viele Geburtstage zu feiern, weil viele "Kinder" eben das ergeben, was das heutige Internet ausmacht. Heute ist so ein Geburtstag: Vor 40 Jahren wurde die erste Nachricht zwischen zwei entfernten Host-Computern ausgetauscht.
Today 199 years ago, the first (modern) optical telegraph line following the mechanical telegraphy system of the French inventor Claude Chappe was established between Metz and Mainz was established. No, this wasn't the first of its kind, but it was the first to connect the former already in France established telegraphy system with a (now) German city.
On April 27, 1737, English historian and Member of Parliament Edward Gibbon was born. His most famous work, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, was published in six volumes between 1776 and 1788 and is known for the quality and irony of its prose as well as for its scientific historic accuracy, which made it a model for later historians.