Computer history - 2003
Major computer events in 2003
Apple opened the iTunes store on April 28, 2003.
Android was founded by Andy Rubin in October 2003.
Tesla was founded in 2003.
2003 computer and technology top terms
The following are some top computer and technology-related terms in alphabetical order that were introduced or popularized in 2003.
New computer products and services introduced in 2003
Intel Pentium M was introduced in March 2003.
AMD released its first 64-bit processor, the Athlon 64, in 2003.
Puppy Linux was introduced in 2003.
PCLinuxOS was introduced in 2003.
Microsoft Windows XP 64-bit edition (version 2003) for Itanium 2 systems was released on March 28, 2003.
Microsoft Windows Server 2003 was released on March 28, 2003.
AMD released the first single-core Opteron processors, with speeds of 1.4 GHz to 2.4 GHz and 1024 KB L2 cache, on April 22, 2003.
WordPress was released on May 27, 2003.
The game Second Life was released on June 23, 2003.
Microsoft introduced Windows Mobile 2003 on June 23, 2003.
The Safari Internet browser was released on June 30, 2003.
Iomega introduced the first RRD (Removable Rigid Disk) on August 12, 2003.
Cool Edit Pro was released on August 18, 2003, and was later renamed to Adobe Audition.
Valve introduced Steam on September 12, 2003.
The social bookmarking service Delicious was released by Joshua Schachter in September 2003.
AMD released the first Athlon 64 processor, the 3200+ (2.0 GHz, 1024 KB L2 cache), and the first Athlon 64 FX processor, the FX-51 (2.2 GHz, 1024 KB L2 cache), on September 23, 2003.
Adobe Premiere Pro was released on September 23, 2003.
Intel announced the new BTX (Balanced Technology eXtended) form factor in 2003.
Adobe Photoshop CS (8.0) was released in October 2003.
Apple introduced macOS X 10.3, code-named Panther, on October 24, 2003.
Microsoft released Excel 2003 in 2003.
Microsoft released Word 2003 in 2003.
Fedora Linux was introduced on November 6, 2003.
ImageShack came online in November 2003.
Apple introduced iSight at the 2003 WWDC (Worldwide Developer Conference).
Pirate Bay came online in November 2003.
Inkscape was released on November 2, 2003.
Microsoft Windows XP Media Center Edition 2003 was released on December 18, 2003.
Microsoft released the game Brute Force for the Xbox in 2003.
Microsoft released FrontPage 2003, which ended up being the last version of Microsoft FrontPage.
DragonFly BSD (Berkeley Software Distribution) was introduced in 2003.
Google released Google Print in December 2003, later becoming Google Book Search.
4chan came online on October 1, 2003.
802.11i was introduced with WPA (Wi-Fi Protected Access) encryption in 2003.
FactHound.com was released in 2003.
IBM announced the eServer zSeries 990, the world's most sophisticated server and the new flagship of the eServer family.
Jitsi was released in 2003 by Emil Love.
Margi became part of QNX, an independent operation of Harman International, in 2003.
The RoHS, RoHS compliant, or RoHS with a checkmark symbol, was introduced for the Restriction of Hazardous Substances Directive. It was adopted by the European Union in 2003.
Scala was introduced in 2003.
SELinux was formally incorporated into the Linux kernel in 2003.
Vegas Pro was released by Sonic Foundry in 2003.
The Sony digital XDCAM was introduced in 2003.
The beta version of XQuartz was released in 2003.
Computer and technology-related events in 2003
The space shuttle Columbia exploded fifteen minutes before it was scheduled to land on February 1, 2003, resulting in the death of all seven crew members.
PCMCIA (Personal Computer Memory Card International Association) announced a new standard, codenamed NEWCARD, on February 19, 2003.
Friendster, one of the first social networking sites, launched in March 2003.
Supreme Court rules that sex offenders' information and pictures can be posted online on March 3, 2003.
VIA introduced the Nano-ITX motherboard form factor in March 2003.
SCO filed a $1 billion lawsuit against IBM on March 6, 2003, for allegedly devaluing its version of Unix by contributing its intellectual property to the codebase of Linux.
The miniSD was introduced to the market by SanDisk in March 2003 at CeBIT.
The first computer was infected with the Spybot worm on April 16, 2003.
The first D Conference was held in May 2003.
The idea and use of CAPTCHAs was introduced in a May 2003 publication titled "CAPTCHA: Using Hard AI (Artificial Intelligence) Problems for Security," and coined the "CAPTCHA" term that same year.
The H.264 standard was completed in May 2003.
XDR DRAM began being sold in 2003.
AVC (Advanced Video Coding) was officially approved in 2003.
DDR2 SDRAM (Synchronous Dynamic Random-Access Memory), the second generation of DDR (Double Data Rate) memory, was released in September 2003.
The website LinkedIn was launched on May 5, 2003.
Sony founded the Digital Living Network Alliance in June 2003.
The Mozilla Foundation was officially formed on July 15, 2003.
The Internet VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) service Skype went public on August 29, 2003.
On September 8, 2003, the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) began to sue individual sharers of copyrighted mp3 files.
Apple added iTunes support for Microsoft Windows computers on October 17, 2003.
The first game in the Call of Duty series was released on October 29, 2003. The game's popularity pushes Infinity Ward to release sequels in three story arcs: World War II, Modern Warfare, and Black Ops. After eight years, the series of games sold over 100 million copies worldwide and boasted 40 million active players.
On November 18, 2003, the EVD (Enhanced Versatile Disc) standard was announced as a replacement for DVD (Digital Versatile Disc).
Notepad++ was released by developer Dan Ho on November 24, 2003, and is still in active development.
President George W. Bush signed CAN-SPAM into law on December 16, 2003, establishing the first United States standards for sending commercial e-mail.
Petra Hofstedt proposed the Brooks multi-paradigm programming language.
C# language became an ISO standard in 2003.
COMDEX (Computer Dealers' Exhibition) ceased operation in 2003.
VLANs were explained for the first time in 2003 in IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers) 802.1Q's first edition as Ethernet VLANs.
Zero chatbot developed by Computer Hope came online in 2003
Computer companies and organizations founded in 2003
Acronis was founded in 2003 by Serguei Beloussov.
Alphacool was founded in 2003.
APWG (Anti-Phishing Working Group) was founded in 2003.
Barracuda was founded in 2003.
Cardo Systems was founded in 2003 by Abraham Glezerman.
EKWB (Edvard König Water Blocks) was founded in 2003 by Edvard König.
E-Tech was founded in 2003.
Gumstix was founded in 2003.
Linode was founded in 2003.
LogMeIn was founded in 2003 by Martin Anka and Michael K. Simon.
MySpace was founded in July 2003.
NComputing was founded in 2003.
Cloud virtualization services company OnLive was founded in 2003.
Purch was founded in 2003.
Shutterstock was founded in 2003.
Silicon Power Computer & Communications was founded in 2003.
SilverStone Technology was founded in 2003.
The Tech Impact organization was founded in 2003.
The Wikimedia Foundation was founded in 2003.
Wondershare was founded in 2003 by Tobee Wu.
XGI Technology was founded by Chris Lin in 2003.
Computer company events in 2003
Microsoft purchased Connectix for the Connectix Virtual PC software and VHD (Virtual Hard Disk) on February 19, 2003, and renamed the product to Microsoft Virtual PC.
Google acquired Blogger on February 17, 2003.
Cisco Systems, Inc. announced on March 20, 2003, its intent to purchase Linksys for $500 million in stock.
Labway went out of business in March 2003.
On April 21, 2003, RealNetworks announced plans to purchase Listen.com (Rhapsody); the deal was completed on August 3, 2003.
Infogrames adopted the legendary brand Atari on May 7, 2003, for its global commercial operations.
On June 09, 2003, Vector Capital Corp acquired Corel and plans on returning the company to a privately held company.
GECAD Software announced a definite agreement with Microsoft to acquire GECAD's antivirus technology on June 10, 2003.
Yahoo! acquired Overture for $1.63 billion on June 14, 2003.
Palm acquired Handspring in June 2003.
Pinnacle acquired Dazzle's consumer video editing business from SCM Microsystems for approximately $21.5 million in July 2003.
On August 4, 2003, NVIDIA acquired MediaQ, Inc., a leader in graphics technology for mobile devices.
Zoran acquired Oak Technology on August 11, 2003.
Symantec acquired PowerQuest and Drive Image for $150 million on September 23, 2003.
Sophos bought antispam vendor ActiveState for $23 million on September 24, 2003.
Best Data purchased the rights to Diamond Multimedia from SONICblue on October 28, 2003.
Curtiss-Wright Controls acquired Systran in December 2003.
CenDyne closed its doors in 2003.
Elektrobau Mulfingen GmbH & Co was renamed to ebm-papst in 2003.
ESS Technologies acquired Divo, Inc. for $27.1 million in cash in 2003.
GT Interactive was acquired by Infogrames in 2003, and it became part of the Atari brand.
As of July 2003, Virgin Interactive runs under Avalon Interactive.
Tally and Genicom merged to form TallyGenicom in 2003.
Security breaches and leaks in 2003
The SQL Slammer (Sapphire) worm was released on January 25, 2003. The worm became the fastest-spreading worm in history after infecting hundreds of thousands of computers on the Internet in less than three hours. Because the code instructs the server to enter an endless loop of continually sending data to other computers, the worm caused distributed denial of service attacks across the Internet.
The Blaster Worm was distributed to Web servers in August 2003.
The Sober computer worm, written in Visual Basic and distributed through e-mail, was first discovered on October 24, 2003.
Computer-related TV shows and movies released in 2003
The 2003 documentary In the Realm of the Hackers, about two teenage hackers who stole a security list called "Zardoz" in the 1980s that helped them break into classified systems was released.
The Matrix Reloaded, a 2003 film that continued the Matrix movie series and featured freedom fighters Neo, Trinity, and Morpheus revolting against the machine army, was released.
The Matrix Revolutions, the conclusion of the Matrix series where the human city of Zion defends itself against the machines, was released in 2003.
Discontinued products and services in 2003
CREN's members decided to dissolve the organization on January 7, 2003.
In December 2003, Wind River discontinued BSD/OS.
In 2003, Red Hat discontinued developing Red Hat Linux and switched its development focus to RHEL (Red Hat Enterprise Linux).
Computer pioneer deaths in 2003
Georgii Lopato passed away on February 13, 2003 (Age: 79).
Julian Bigelow passed away on February 21, 2003 (Age: 90).
Roger Needham passed away on March 1, 2003 (Age: 68).
Adam Osborne passed away on March 18, 2003 (Age: 64).
Edgar Codd passed away on April 18, 2003 (Age: 80).
Glen Culler passed away on May 3, 2003 (Age: 76).
I. Bernard Cohen passed away on June 23, 2003 (Age: 89).
Eugene Kleiner passed away on November 20, 2003 (Age: 80).
Mark Pinsker passed away on December 23, 2003 (Age: 78).