

August 23rd in nerd history: Let's call it the World Wide Web
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August 23 in Nerd History
Here are 5 things that happened on August 23rd for those of us who wander, but are not lost.
I.
Birthdays of honor: River Phoenix (1970), Kobe Bryant (1978), Shelley Long (1949), Keith Moon (1946), Rick Springfield (1949).
II.
While there’s a lot of bickering about which date the World Wide Web truly launched, many believe August 23, 1991, should be that date. That’s the day that one of the fathers of the internet, Tim-Berners Lee, made the very first webpage (which he built and hosted on his own computer) available to the public.
I know this sounds crazy, but why not fire up the ol’ computer and log in to the ‘net today to celebrate?

III.
Today in 2007, Brian May — guitarist for Queen — earned his Ph.D. in astrophysics. He claims he would have finished it sooner if his music career hadn’t got in the way. Sounds like a slacker to me.

IV.
In 1974 there was a UFO sighting over New York City — notable primarily because the observer was John Lennon, who spotted what he called a typical flying saucer from his apartment window. Hard to think of anyone whose senses were more trustworthy than the dude who sang, “I am the walrus, goo goo g’joob.”

V.
You can tell we’re getting into the other side of summer blockbuster season (boo!), because the list of classic movies released today is slim. However, there is one worth noting: Showdown in Little Tokyo, which came out in limited release in 1991.
This buddy-cop movie teams up perennial ’80s big dude Dolph Lundgren with Brandon Lee in his movie debut. The duo shares ironic backgrounds: Lundgren plays an American cop raised in Japan, while Lee’s character was raised in America but is of Japanese descent. They disagree on a lot of things, but bond over their love of martial arts. That’s all you really need to know about this movie, which ended up being mostly a direct-to-video release.
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