History
The term 'cybernetics' was coined in Norbert Wiener's book Cybernetics or Control and Communication in the Animal and the Machine (MIT Press, 1948).Wiener used the term in reference to the control of complex systems in the animal world and in mechanical networks, in particular self-regulating control systems. By 1960, doctors were performing research into surgically or mechanically augmenting humans or animals to operate machinery in space, leading to the coining of the term "cyborg," for "cybernetic organism."
Fred J Cook (Winner of the 1961 Hillman Award) in his 1966 book "The Corrupted Land : The Social Morality of Modern America" introduces his book with "such ideals as free enterprise, 'rugged individualism' and laissez faire are anachronisms in this age of CYBERNATION."
By the 1970s, the Control Data Corporation (CDC) sold the "Cyber" range of supercomputers, establishing the word cyber- as synonymous with computing. Robert Trappl credits William Gibson and his novel Neuromancer with triggering a "cyber- prefix flood" in the 1980s.
McFedries observes that a backlash against the use of e- and cyber- can be traced to the late 1990s, quoting Hale and Scanlon requesting writers in 1999 to "resist the urge to use this vowel-as-cliché" when it comes to e- and calling cyber- "terminally overused."
i- is not a generic prefix used to describe a type of service or product; rather, it is used in the branding of individual products. The i- prefix is especially connected to Apple Inc., who employed it for their iMac and iBook and now uses many product names starting with i-, including iPod, iTunes, iPhone, iLife and others. Apple initially said the i stood for "Internet."
Despite its close association with Apple, the i- prefix has been used by other companies as well, such as Google (iGoogle) and the BBC (iPlayer). It has also been used extensively by shareware and freeware developers in the branding of their products, and even by non-IT companies for their online sites, such as icoke.com. iCarly is a television show in which the main character hosts her own web show.
Read more about this topic: Internet-related Prefixes
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“In history an additional result is commonly produced by human actions beyond that which they aim at and obtainthat which they immediately recognize and desire. They gratify their own interest; but something further is thereby accomplished, latent in the actions in question, though not present to their consciousness, and not included in their design.”
—Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (17701831)
“Certainly there is not the fight recorded in Concord history, at least, if in the history of America, that will bear a moments comparison with this, whether for the numbers engaged in it, or for the patriotism and heroism displayed.”
—Henry David Thoreau (18171862)
“In the history of the human mind, these glowing and ruddy fables precede the noonday thoughts of men, as Aurora the suns rays. The matutine intellect of the poet, keeping in advance of the glare of philosophy, always dwells in this auroral atmosphere.”
—Henry David Thoreau (18171862)