14 DAY TRIAL // Steve Wozniak, born Friday, August 11, 1950 in San Jose, California, is 59 years old today. Woz is an American computer engineer of Polish descent who founded Apple Computer (now Apple Inc.) alongside Steve Jobs. He is one of America’s favorite geeks.
Steve Wozniak, also known as the “Woz” among members of the Apple community, has several key inventions and machines credited to him. He has contributed significantly to the personal computer revolution of the 1970s with the creation of the Apple I and Apple II computers. The Apple II became a winner and was later declared one of the best-selling personal computers of the 1970s and early 1980s. Wozniak is listed as the sole inventor on a number of patents, which include: US Patent No. 4,136,359 - "Microcomputer for use with video display"[14] - for which he was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame. US Patent No. 4,210,959 - "Controller for magnetic disc, recorder, or the like" US Patent No. 4,217,604 - "Apparatus for digitally controlling pal color display" US Patent No. 4,278,972 - "Digitally-controlled color signal generation means for use with display"
Woz is also a philanthropist and knows his way around with a Segway. His favorite video game is Tetris. It is said that during the 90s, he submitted so many high scores for the game to Nintendo Power that they would no longer print his scores. The clever Woz didn’t give up, and so he started sending the scores using his alphabetically reversed name (Evets Kainzow).
The Apple co-founder is also a member on Axiotron’s Board of Advisors, currently the only company capable of making a proper, touchscreen Mac tablet out of original MacBook and MacBook Pro notebooks. For this, Woz claims he likes 'smaller companies [with] new ideas' and helps out when and where he can, as long as there’s circuitry involved.
America can never have enough of the guy. Fans of the “Dancing with the Stars” competition and TV show simply adored the rather clumsy dancer, although the judges would not let his charm get to them. With this chapter ended, Woz proved to the world that he could do just about anything. We can’t wait to see what other types of activities he engages himself in.
On behalf of the Softpedia Mac section, the most sincere Happy Birthday goes out to Woz!