I have many fond memories of the Jackson 5. My childhood room had J-5 pictures on every wall, my mother took me to see the Jackson 5 in Memphis at the Mid-South coliseum and when they were signing autographs at Southland Mall, she stood in the long lines with me just so I could see Jermaine.
I was 9-months pregnant the week that “Thriller” was released. The album came out on a Tuesday, and I gave birth on that Thursday. No, I didn’t name my baby MJ, but my child’s first outing after we left the hospital was to pick up my album that I had pre-ordered (there had been a waiting list). My baby would wake up out of a deep sleep anytime a MJ song played. Although he couldn’t say Michael, he began calling him “Me-me.”
I would later get a sense of Déjà vu in 1988, when I stood in the long lines at Houston’s Bay Brook mall to get my son a ticket to see MJ. It was a show of a lifetime; I am so happy I had the chance to go and share that memory with my son.
Did you know?....
Michael Jackson Facts
Most Successful Concert Series - Guinness Book Of World Records
Michael Jackson sold out for seven nights at Wembley Stadium, London, England in the summer of 1988. A total of 504,000 people saw Michael perform July 14-16, 22-23, and August 26-27, 1988.
Biggest Selling Album Of All Time - Guinness Book Of World Records
Michael Jackson's "Thriller" Album is the biggest selling album of all time, with over 50 million copies sold worldwide. Thriller is also the biggest selling U.S album with sales of 25 million copies.
80's Most #1 Hits
By The End of the 1980's Michael Jackson had more #1 hits than any other artist for the decade.
Michael Awards
Michael has more awards than any other artist.
Entertainer Of The Decade
With the #1 (Thriller) and #2 (Bad) ranked albums in the world Michael was the 1980's Entertainer Of The Decade.
Most Grammy Awards - Guinness Book Of World Records
Michael won a record breaking 8 Grammy Awards in 1984, more than any other artist in one year.
Largest Contracts - Guiness Book Of World Records
$890 million (Sony Music) Contract, with prospective earnings of $1 billion.
Greatest Audience - Guiness Book Of World Records
The highest-ever viewership was 133.4 million viewers watching the NBC transmission of Super Bowl XXVII on June 31, 1993. Michael was spotlighted during the half-time peformance.
Highest-Paid Commercial Spokesperson - Guiness Book Of World Records
Pepsi Cola paid Michael Jackson $12 million to do 4 TV commercials.
Bad Tour - Guinness Book Of World Records
Michael Jackson's world tour brought in a record gross revenue of over $124 million during September 1987-December 1988.
100 Million Records
Michael has sold over 100 million singles and albums outside of the U.S.
Billboard Charts
Michael Jackson is the first person in the 37 year history of the chart to enter at # 1, with his single "You Are Not Alone". Michael broke his previous redord held by his single "Earth Song" which debuted at #5.
Biggest Selling Video
Michael Jackson's "The Making Of Thriller" is the biggest selling video to be released by an artist.
Billboard "Hot 100" Singles Chart
Most #1 Hits by Male Artist (13)
#1 Debuts
Michael's "Bad", "Dangerous", and "HIStory" albums all debuted at #1.
Consecutive #1 Singles
Jackson 5 were the first group to ever have four consecutive #1 singles.
#1 On Charts
In 1983 Michael became the first artist to simultaneously hold the number one spots on Billboard's rock albums and rock singles charts, as well as the R&B albums and singles charts.
First Video
Michael Jackson was the first black artist to have a video aired on MTV.
Page-perfect Touchscreen e-Reader will Revolutionize Mobile Computing
by J.E. Robertson from:
3 March 2009 :: by J.E. Robertson
The Amazon Kindle is a nice device, and it handles its job well, but it is just a very clumsy start to what will be a technological convergence few in mainstream media (and publishing) are anticipating, though it may not be far off. The page-perfect, for lack of a better term, e-reading device will make portable electronic reading easier and more comfortable than ever, packing huge amounts of data, as well as wireless downloading and even browsing capability, into an ultrathin tablet touchscreen.
The device may, after one or two initial iterations, come to have the computing power of today’s less expensive laptop computers, and will capitalize on the great discoveries in user-interface technology that have emerged from the introduction of the iPhone into the mainstream consumer market.
Whether it will belong to Apple, or be the next generation of the Amazon Kindle, or whether an as-yet-unknown pioneer in consumer electronics will pull it off, e-paper technology is certainly advanced enough to make it possible, and it’s just a matter of time until someone figures out the best way to market such a product, building on the success of the Kindle, the iPhone, the inexpensive streamlined netbook, and ever more available flat-rate unlimited mobile web services.
What is happening right now in the investigation of e-paper technology, at MIT especially, is promising in the extreme, warranting enthusiasm about great leaps in speed and ease of use, as computing circuitry advances to make the tactile e-paper device more like a fully-functional touchscreen.
What looks and feels a lot like paper and will produce ultra-sharp black-and-white text displays, will also be able to produce high-quality color and a mutable graphic-user-interface that allows for typing, searching, scrolling and all sorts of more agile file-search and manipulation. One-touch downloading and nearly full-sized qwerty-keyboard interaction will make the page-perfect tablet into a replacement for today’s netbooks.
Such a device may even use state of the art plastics and be flexible, so it can be used like a laptop when the user desires and like a tablet when more comfortable for reading. The art of the page-perfect reader will be in its ability to make the experience of reading electronic text more natural and more comfortable for the end-user, mimicking better the experience of reading a magazine or newspaper than today’s smaller-screen, reformatted reading devices.
Molecular or chemical computing advances must also be considered, as their impact on the power of ultra-thin devices cannot be overstated. The ability to pack as much computing power as today’s laptops have into a space literally millions of times smaller, with circuitry operating at the molecular level and with circuits that can process not just 16 or 32 commands simultaneously, but 1024 or 2048 or more, means far higher speeds and far less space needed.
The potential for creating impact-resistant or flex-resistant panels that display text and images with the fidelity of paper, is also advancing. What some saw as pure science fiction in the movie Minority Report, newspapers that adapt and update spontaneously, based on environment, time, and the service’s own updating schedule, will likely be one phase in the convergence of the web, news content and personal reading devices.
It will not happen tomorrow, but such levels of connected browsing and communication are possible, and will be available, possibly within a decade. Engineers of reading devices, mobile phones, and even publication networks, should take into account these many coming advances in order to best shape their projects and offerings to the desire consumers have for maximum potential portability, maximum natural feel while reading, and maximum available information, at the lowest possible cost.
