SIMON SAYS START OF SMARTPHONES

In the fall and winter of 1994, IBM launched the release of IBM Simon. This was a cellular phone and a PDA (personal digital assistant)  matched into one portable device. The device was assembled under Bellsouth Cellular Corp. The device was able to receive and send  cellular phone calls,  faxes, email, and cellular pages (remember those?). Initial cost of the device was about $1000.

AMERICAS PASTIME TAKES A BREAK AND CANADA SUFFERS

As the baseball postseason is about to get underway, we remember that 20 years ago the 1994 Major League Baseball season was cut short by a player's strike and no postseason happened. A total of 943 games were cancelled in all and the strike lasted a total of 232 days. The strike most affected the Montreal Expos, who had baseball best record at that time with a lineup that included Larry Walker, Pedro Martinez, Moses Alou, and Marquis Grissom. They had the second lowest payroll in the MLB. But after the strike, they lost their fan base and their top players to free agency. The team was bought by MLB in 2001 and now are known as the Washington Nationals (By the way, the Nationals are in the post season with the best record in baseball).

THE ANSWER IS NOT CLEAR!

In 1992, PepsiCo launched a clear non-caffeinated soda called Clear Pepsi. The launch was inspired from the early nineties fad that equated clearness with health and well-being. Coke soon followed suite with Clear Tab. Van Halen even sang a song for its commercial in 1993. However, the product was soon pulled of the market when sales went down.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KPvyq_KmXhc

FLANEL MAKES A COME BACK

In the early nineties, flanel made a come back as a fashion statement. Initially, reveled in the 1970's, Grunge mania was now making flanel fashion the 'in thing" again. Many Grunge bands were formed outside of Seattle where tree cutters use to wear flanel due to its warmth and low price. When these bands wore their normal region fashion attire and appeared on MTV, well then it became de novo again. But just like everything, over exposure was soon to come. Soon flanel was being sported down the run ways in fashion shows and making covers of fashion magazines.

MAGIC EYE BRINGS MAGIC

At around the fall of 1992, the Magic Eye posters were spreading throughout bookstores and local college campuses. These posters showed autostereograms that allowed one to see a hidden 3D images by zooming in on 2D patterns. Soon in 1993, a series of  Magic Eye books were released.