Microsoft releases its Windows graphical interface operating system that improves upon MS-DOS. Ted Waitt starts a mail-order personal computer business (Gateway 2000) out of his South Dakota barn.1990 Microsoft introduces Windows 3.0 which, like Macintosh, features windows, icons, and pull-down menus. Apple sues Microsoft for copyright infringement. 1991 The World Wide Web (an Internet system) is invented.1993 Intel introduces its first of several Pentium chips, which greatly speeds up computing. The courts reject Apple’s claim that Microsoft violated its copyrights on its Macintosh operating system.1994 Marc Andreessen starts up Netscape Communications and markets Netscape Navigator, which quickly becomes the leading software browser for the emerging Internet. David Filo and Jerry Yang develop Yahoo, a system for locating material stored on the Internet. 1995 Microsoft releases Windows 95 operating system, and it becomes the dominant operating system of personal computers (90 percent market share). Microsoft is now well established as the world’s leading software producer. Sun Microsystems introduces Java, an Internet programming language.1996 Playing catch-up with Netscape, Microsoft develops Microsoft Internet Explorer and gives it away free. More than 40 million personal computers are manufactured worldwide during this year alone. 1997 Oracle Computers introduces a relatively inexpensive “network” computer that bypasses Windows and goes directly to the Internet. Forbes magazine reports that among the top-50 wealthiest Americans are several people associated with the personal computer business: Gates ($40 billion), Allen ($17 billion), Lawrence Ellison (Oracle; database and spreadsheet software, $9 billion), Gordon Moore (Intel; $9 billion), Steven Ballmer (Microsoft; $8 billion), Dell ($6 billion), William Hewlett (Hewlett-Packard; $4 billion), and Waitt ($3 billion). More than one out of four U.S. h...
