Episode notes
The Y2K bug generated a lot of fear, but all that hype fizzled when the new millennium didn’t start with a digital apocalypse. It turns out that fear was just aimed at the wrong catastrophe. While plenty were riding high on the rise of the internet beyond the Y2K scare, another disaster had been brewing since 1995—and would bring them back down. But the dot-com bubble wasn’t the end. The internet was here to stay. Not long after the turn of the millennium, the dot-com economy collapsed. Peter Relan points to the flawed business plans that fueled the dot-com bubble, and how many entrepreneurs…
Podcast
Command Line Heroes
Red Hat · Tech & Science · English
Red Hat's storytelling podcast about the people who transform technology — open source pioneers, programming language creators and OS architects.
More from Command Line Heroes All episodes →
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S8 · E4 · 19 Oct 2021 · 22 min
Robot as Humanoid
It’s hard enough to make a functional, reliable robot. Many people also want to make those robots in our image. That’s a tough needle to thread. Often, the most efficient design isn’t the most human-like one. But that isn’t stopping us from reaching for those humanoid robots. Professor Shigeki Sugano argues in favor of creating human-shaped robots. But it’s such an enduring challenge, we’ve come up with a name for it: the uncanny valley. Evan Ackerman walks us through the uncanny valley’s treacherous terrain. Deanna Dezern shares how she’s connected to her robot companion. And Dor Skuler…
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S8 · E3 · 5 Oct 2021 · 25 min
Robot as Maker
One of the first functional robots appeared on TV in 1966. That’s earlier than some of us expect. The Unimate’s televised premiere sparked the world’s imagination. It represented a host of possibilities. Those possibilities, however, also implied a coming competition that would last for decades. Dag Spicer tells the story of the Unimate, the first industrial robot—and how little the American public trusted it. But that distrust wasn’t universal. Tomonori Sanada explains how the Unimate was received very differently in Japan. Joe Campbell describes the dangers of working alongside industrial…
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S8 · E2 · 21 Sep 2021 · 23 min
Robot as Software
Building a physical robot isn’t cheap—even when it’s the final version. Designing a robot and testing it over and over again? That takes a lot of tries. And likely more than a few failures on the way to success. Luckily, simulation software is reducing the scrap heap—and bringing down the costs of building robots from the ground up. Kevin Knoedler shares how simulation software allows him to program and design robots from home. And even though he doesn’t have the budget or support of major research institutions like DARPA, his robots still end up winning major competitions. Evan Ackerman…
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S8 · E1 · 7 Sep 2021 · 25 min
Robot as Servant
The 1980s promised robotic servants were in reach. They’d clean up our houses. Bring us drinks. Usher in an era of leisure. We didn’t get robot butlers. But if we look around, we’ll find an army of robotic servants already automating away domestic drudgery. Richard Rowland recounts the extent to which Androbot over-promised on its ability to build a robot servant. 40 years later, we still don’t have robot maids. Monroe Kennedy III walks us through the complexities of seemingly simple tasks. To make things more difficult, each attempt to build a robot had to build the hardware AND write the…
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S8 · 24 Aug 2021 · 2 min
Command Line Heroes Season 8: Broadcasting the Robot Revolution
Robots have a special place in our imaginations. Writers, artists, directors, and more have shown how robots can change our world—for better or far, far worse. In the real world, robots seem a long way off. But are they? Season 8 of Command Line Heroes is all about the rise of the robots. They just may not be what you expect. We meet the first industrial robot, take a journey through the uncanny valley, and investigate a possible robot crime. Season 8 covers the robots that are in our midst—and the determined dreamers who bring them to life. The first episode drops September 7, 2021. Follow…
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S7 · E7 · 15 Jun 2021 · 27 min
The World of the World Wide Web
1995 laid the groundwork for a truly global World Wide Web. But not every country took the same path to connecting to the internet. Some resisted, wanting to create their own version. Others had to fight for access, not wanting to be left behind. And while we made huge strides in connecting the world in those early years, we still have a long way to go. Julien Mailland recounts the rollout of France’s Minitel service—how it was years ahead of the internet, but eventually lost its lead. Steve Goldstein explains what was involved in building the infrastructure to expand the NSFNET beyond the…
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S7 · E6 · 1 Jun 2021 · 25 min
Looking for Search
The web was growing quickly in the ‘90s. But all that growth wasn’t going to lead to much if people couldn’t actually find any web sites. In 1995, an innovative new tool started crawling the web. And the search engine it fed opened the doors to the World Wide Web. Elizabeth Van Couvering describes trying to find websites before search engines, and how difficult it was becoming in the early ’90s to keep track of them all. Louis Monier talks about having to convince others how important search engines would become—and he showed them what a web crawler could do. Paul Cormier recounts taking the…
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S7 · E5 · 18 May 2021 · 25 min
Shopping for the Web
We put a lot of trust into online shopping: sharing our names, addresses, and handing over money. In return, we have faith that the purchased item appears at our doorstep in a few days or weeks. That trust didn’t come easily. In 1995, we took our first steps out of the brick and mortar store to load our digital shopping cart. Robert Spector reveals how Amazon.com’s business foundations are in data—and being early to the internet. Sandeep Krishnamurthy recounts the rise of eBay. Angela Robinson describes the technology that makes secure transactions and trustworthy e-commerce possible. Kartik…
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S7 · E4 · 4 May 2021 · 25 min
Web UX Begins
Looking at the internet in 1995 is like looking back at awkward grade school yearbooks—all the weirdness and flaws stand out in stark contrast to what it’s grown into since. And web design took awhile to become a career—but it got a big boost in 1995. When the Batman Forever website launched to promote the movie, it showed people what was possible on the web. And it forever changed what we’d expect from a website. Jay Hoffmann describes the quirky designs of the early web. Richard Vijgen explains how we went from a lack of conventions to a homogenized web. Jeffrey Zeldman recounts building…
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S7 · E3 · 20 Apr 2021 · 26 min
A Language for the Web
The Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) gave everyone a foundation for building and viewing the World Wide Web. In 1995, its standardization led to dominance. Its simplicity helped it spread. And its solid common foundation helped shape the internet. Dr. Belinda Barnet explains what kind of framework was initially needed to build and navigate the Web. Jeff Veen describes the three ingredients Tim Berners-Lee combined to create HTML: the ideal language for the Web. Gavin Nicol recounts the need to standardize the quickly-growing language. And Gretchen McCulloch points out how HTML instills an…
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