The Tech Landscape #128 👨💻
In 1986 I persuaded my dad to buy me my first home computer, the ZX Spectrum 128, promising that I would pay him back in montly installments. I never paid...
The Tech Landscape #127 💪
The film 127 Hours is based on Aron Ralston’s memoir, Beyond a Rock and a Hard Place, about his rescue from Blue John Canyon. In the six years before the...
The Tech Landscape #126 🤞
Lab126 is Amazon’s R&D arm, responsible for the Kindle, Fire, and Echo device ranges. It’s name comes from the smiley / arrow in Amazon’s logo, which runs...
The Tech Landscape #125 🏛
Rome’s Pantheon was completed, in its current form, in 125 CE. Despite being 1,894 years old it’s still the largest unreinforced concrete dome ever built. I...
The Tech Landscape #124 😴
In 2001 the RAC (formerly the Royal Automobile Club) launched its own energy drink in collaboration with Sprite. Called RAC 124, it was intended to give...
The Tech Landscape #123 🖼
The Jackson 5 claimed that ABC is as easy as 123, but all evidence indicates that counting was developed long before writing. I was reminded this week that...
The Tech Landscape #122 🧵
Hadrian’s Wall, begun in 122 CE, was garrisoned by soldiers from across the Roman empire, including troops from (modern day) Belgium, Romania, Spain, and...
The Tech Landscape #121 👓
There are 121 places in Finland called Paskalampi, which translates as “Sh!t Pond”. The number rises to 426 when you include the alternative spelling,...
The Tech Landscape #120 🦟
Food additive E120, or Carmine, is a bright red colouring used in sweets, juices, ice cream, yoghurt, and many cosmetics. It’s produced by boiling red scale...
The Tech Landscape #119 🍚
Kangxi Radical 119, 米, is the character for the Chinese word for rice: “mi”. The Chinese brand Xiaomi (“little rice”, or “millet”) uses this character in its...
The Tech Landscape #118 💑
There are 118 known elements, but the periodic table can be extended to 126 to include eight hypothetical elements. It was the IFA consumer electronics show...
The Tech Landscape #117 💬
Secret agent Hubert Bonisseur de La Bath, codenamed OSS 117, appeared in 88 books and 10 films in France. He was created four years before James Bond, 007. I...
The Tech Landscape #116 🇨🇳
The ‘Hundred Years War’ is the name given by historians to a series of conflicts over the right to rule the Kingdom of France, fought by the royal houses of...
The Tech Landscape #115 🧸
The Nakajima Ki-115 Tsurugi was a World War II Japanese kamikaze plane planned to be used in the event of the invasion of Japan. It was very cheap and aimed...
The Tech Landscape #114 📻
The CRM114 Discriminator is a software filtering system which catches email spam with almost 99.9% accuracy. The name comes from a fictional piece of radio...
The Tech Landscape #113 🕵️♀️🕵🏾♂️
The Cannibis Sativa plant contains over 500 pharmacological compounds, of which 113 are unique to the plant, and so known as cannabinoids. Quite a few...
The Tech Landscape #112 👻
112 Ocean Avenue, Long Island, New York, is the address of the house featured in the book The Amityville Horror, a supposedly true story of paranormal...
The Tech Landscape #111
A cricket score of 111 is known as ‘a Nelson’ after Admiral Horatio Nelson who was said to have had one eye, one arm, and one leg. In fact, Nelson never lost...
The Tech Landscape #110 🃏
Heron Tower (to use it’s popular appellation) is the tallest building in the City of London and has the largest privately-owned aquarium in the UK. When...
The Tech Landscape #109 🇺🇸
The bible’s Psalm 109 contains pleas for many curses against someone who has wronged the author. These include “let his days be few; and let another take his...