• Approximately 730,000 personal computers are sold world-wide.
• Seagate Technologies develop the first hard drive for the microcomputer, featuring five megabytes of storage.
• Apple computer magazine _Nibble_ is started by Mike Harvey.
• Ted Turner's 24 hour news channel CNN (Cable News Network) begins broadcasting, with 2.4 million subscribers.
• First issue of Computer Shopper is published.

 

• _Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back_ (vhs/ntsc)is the top grossing movie of the year, pulling in $290,158,751 domestically in the US.
• Satellite Software International is founded, and releases Word Perfect 1.0.
• Commodore president Jack Tramiel announces plans at a strategy meeting in London, England to produce a $300  USD personal computer.
• Alfred Hitchcock dies.
• Fed up with Gary Kildall's Digital Research delays with porting a version of its CP/M operating system to their line of computers, Seattle Computer Products decides to create an OS themselves. Employee Tim Patterson begins work on it.
• Steve Ballmer goes to work for Microsoft.
• John Lennon (The Beatles) is assassinated while entering his apartment building in New York.
• Paul McCartney (The Beatles) spends ten days in prison in Japan for possession of cannabis.
• Speak and Spell is released by Texas Instruments.
• New "Tonight Show" guest host and rising star David Letterman's doomed morning program "The David Letterman Show" hits the airwaves weekdays on NBC from 10-11:30am. After introducing such concepts as kamakazi steet interviews, roaming remotes from inside NBC's New York headquarters and "Stupid Pet Tricks", as well as winning two Emmy awards, the show is cancelled in 19 weeks despite viewers' protests to keep it on the air.
• Microsoft signs a deal with IBM to port BASIC over to the new IBM PC. IBM gets a cold shoulder from Killdall and Digital Research about using the CP/M operating system as the PC's Disk Operating System (DOS).
• Tim Berners-Lee begins toying with the idea of HTML, the language of the World Wide Web.
• Commodore releases the VIC-20, selling for $300 USD. One million units are sold.
• Over 78,000 Apple II's are sold.
• Paul Allen purchases Seattle Computer's Quick and Dirty Operating System (QDOS) for under 100,000 dollars.   After some modifications Microsoft renames it MS-DOS and it is integrated into IBM's PC.
• Apple Computers goes public, selling 4.6 million shares at $22 a share.
• The CD-Audio standard is created by Sony and Phillips.
• Communication theorist Marshall McLuhan dies of a stroke.

• _Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back_ (vhs/ntsc) directed by Irving Kirschner, produced and created by George Lucas
• the best of the series
• _Rude Boy_ (vhs/ntsc) featuring The Clash
• _Decline Of Western Civilization_ (vhs/ntsc)  directed by Penelope Spheeris
• _Altered States_  (vhs/ntsc)directed by Ken Russell
• _Scanners_  (vhs/ntsc) directed by David Cronenberg
• _The Shining_  (vhs/ntsc) directed by Stanley Kubrick

• electro release _Forget The 80's_ 12" by Decal on Satamile #008 (2001)
  • a1 _Riptide_
  • b1 _Prepare To Merge_ MP3 (192k)
  • b2 _Stay Dazed_
• breakbeat techno track _Decayed Decade_ MP3 by Dave Tarrida off of _Postmortem Pop_ 12" on Tresor #126 (1999)
• industrial new wave track _Eighties_ MP3 (160k) by Killing Joke

releases:

• _Academy Fight Song MP3/Max Ernst_ MP3  7" by Mission Of Burma on Ace Of Hearts
• "dada dada dada..."
• _Ethics_ by 23 Skidoo
• _Back In Black_ by AC/DC

• _British Steel_ by Judas Priest
• _Remain In Light_  12" by Talking Heads
  • 2. _Crosseyed & Painless_ MP3
  • 6. _Seen & Not Seen_ MP3 (192k)
• _Freedom Of Choice_ 12" by Devo
• _Sandanista!_ 12"x3 by The Clash

• _Permanent Waves_ by Rush
• _Moving Pictures_ 12" by Rush
• _Uprising_ 12" by Bob Marley & The Wailers
• _Los Angeles_ 12" by X (produced by Ray Manzarek of The Doors)
• _Heaven And Hell_ 12" by Black Sabbath
• one fucking amazing come back album.  the diminutive Dio on vocals
• _The Age Of Plastic_ 12" by The Buggles - hail hail the age of video

miscellaneous:

• book _VALIS_ by Philip K. Dick
• book _The Illuminati Papers_ by Robert Anton Wilson

• text adventure game _Zork: The Great Underground Empire_
• classic coin-op videogame _Defender_ is released by pinball manufacturer Williams
• classic vector graphic coin-op videogame _Tempest_ is released by Atari

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