Editing Information Age (section)

===Computers===
{{main|Computer|History of computing hardware}}
{{further|Integrated circuit|Invention of the integrated circuit|Microprocessor|Moore's law}}

Before the advent of [[electronics]], [[mechanical computer]]s, like the [[Analytical Engine]] in 1837, were designed to provide routine mathematical calculation and simple decision-making capabilities. Military needs during [[World War II]] drove development of the first electronic computers, based on [[vacuum tube]]s, including the [[Z3 (computer)|Z3]], the [[Atanasoff–Berry Computer]], [[Colossus computer]], and [[ENIAC]].

The invention of the transistor enabled the era of [[mainframe computer]]s (1950s–1970s), typified by the [[IBM System/360|IBM 360]]. These large, [[History of computing hardware|room-sized computers]] provided data calculation and [[Data manipulation language|manipulation]] that was much faster than humanly possible, but were expensive to buy and maintain, so were initially limited to a few scientific institutions, large corporations, and government agencies.

The [[germanium]] [[integrated circuit]] (IC) was invented by [[Jack Kilby]] at [[Texas Instruments]] in 1958.<ref>{{Citation|first=Jack|last=Kilby|author-link=Jack Kilby|title=Nobel lecture|publisher=Nobel Foundation|year=2000|location=Stockholm|url=http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/2000/kilby-lecture.pdf|access-date=15 May 2008|archive-date=29 May 2008|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080529024119/http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/2000/kilby-lecture.pdf|url-status=live}}</ref> The [[silicon]] integrated circuit was then invented in 1959 by [[Robert Noyce]] at [[Fairchild Semiconductor]], using the [[planar process]] developed by [[Jean Hoerni]], who was in turn building on [[Mohamed Atalla]]'s silicon [[Passivation (chemistry)|surface passivation]] method developed at [[Bell Labs]] in 1957.<ref name="Lojek120">{{cite book |last1=Lojek |first1=Bo |title=History of Semiconductor Engineering |date=2007 |publisher=[[Springer Science & Business Media]] |isbn=9783540342588 |page=120}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Bassett |first1=Ross Knox |title=To the Digital Age: Research Labs, Start-up Companies, and the Rise of MOS Technology |date=2007 |publisher=Johns Hopkins University Press |isbn=9780801886393 |page=46 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=UUbB3d2UnaAC&pg=PA46 |access-date=2019-07-31 |archive-date=2020-07-27 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200727075911/https://books.google.com/books?id=UUbB3d2UnaAC&pg=PA46 |url-status=live }}</ref> Following the invention of the [[MOSFET|MOS transistor]] by Mohamed Atalla and [[Dawon Kahng]] at Bell Labs in 1959,<ref name="computerhistory"/> the [[MOSFET|MOS]] integrated circuit was developed by Fred Heiman and Steven Hofstein at [[RCA]] in 1962.<ref name="computerhistory-digital">{{cite web |title=Tortoise of Transistors Wins the Race – CHM Revolution |url=https://www.computerhistory.org/revolution/digital-logic/12/279 |website=[[Computer History Museum]] |access-date=22 July 2019 |archive-date=10 March 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200310142421/https://www.computerhistory.org/revolution/digital-logic/12/279 |url-status=live }}</ref> The [[silicon-gate]] MOS IC was later developed by [[Federico Faggin]] at Fairchild Semiconductor in 1968.<ref>{{cite web |title=1968: Silicon Gate Technology Developed for ICs |url=https://www.computerhistory.org/siliconengine/silicon-gate-technology-developed-for-ics/ |website=[[Computer History Museum]] |access-date=22 July 2019 |archive-date=29 July 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200729145834/https://www.computerhistory.org/siliconengine/silicon-gate-technology-developed-for-ics/ |url-status=live }}</ref> With the advent of the MOS transistor and the MOS IC, transistor technology [[Moore's law|rapidly improved]], and the ratio of computing power to size increased dramatically, giving direct access to computers to ever smaller groups of people.

The first commercial single-chip microprocessor launched in 1971, the [[Intel 4004]], which was developed by Federico Faggin using his silicon-gate MOS IC technology, along with [[Marcian Hoff]], [[Masatoshi Shima]] and [[Stan Mazor]].<ref>{{cite web |title=1971: Microprocessor Integrates CPU Function onto a Single Chip |url=https://www.computerhistory.org/siliconengine/microprocessor-integrates-cpu-function-onto-a-single-chip/ |website=[[Computer History Museum]] |access-date=22 July 2019 |archive-date=12 August 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210812104243/https://www.computerhistory.org/siliconengine/microprocessor-integrates-cpu-function-onto-a-single-chip/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="Colinge2016">{{cite book |last1=Colinge |first1=Jean-Pierre |last2=Greer |first2=James C. |last3=Greer |first3=Jim |title=Nanowire Transistors: Physics of Devices and Materials in One Dimension |date=2016 |publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] |isbn=9781107052406 |page=2 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FvjUCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA2 |access-date=2019-07-22 |archive-date=2020-03-17 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200317123719/https://books.google.com/books?id=FvjUCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA2 |url-status=live }}</ref>

Along with electronic [[arcade cabinet|arcade machines]] and [[home video game console]]s pioneered by [[Nolan Bushnell]] in the 1970s, the development of personal computers like the [[Commodore PET]] and [[Apple II]] (both in 1977) gave individuals access to computers. However, [[data sharing]] between individual computers was either non-existent or largely [[sneaker net|manual]], at first using [[punched card]]s and [[magnetic tape]], and later [[floppy disk]]s.