And translating from their arcane vocabulary:
  • Prelims: first year undergrad
  • Honour school; other years of undergrad, sometimes it includes masters others not which is confusing
  • MPhil, MSc, MSt: masters
This one took a while! Major developments were from the 70s! Perhaps it took the Internet revolution to make its importance clear.
Crystal detector by Ciro Santilli 37 Updated 2025-07-16
The first diodes. These were apparently incredibly unreliable, especially for portable radios, as you had to randomly search for the best contact point you could find in a random polycrystalline material!!
And also quality was highly dependant on where the material was sourced from as that affected the impurities present in the material. Later this was understood to be an issue of doping.
It was so unreliable that vacuum tube diodes overtook them in many applications, even though crystal detectors are actually semiconductor diodes, which eventually won over!
For a long time, before artificial semiconductors kicked in, people just didn't know the underlying physical working principle of these detectors. What I cannot create, I do not understand basically.
Crystal radio by Ciro Santilli 37 Updated 2025-07-16
This was the first generation of commercially successful radios.
It uses a crystal detector as its diode, which is a crucial element of the radio, thus its name.
They were superseded by transistor radios, which were much more reliable, portable and could amplify the signal received.
Video 1.
How a Crystal radio Works by RimstarOrg
. Source.
Charles K. Kao by Ciro Santilli 37 Updated 2025-07-16
Figure 2.
2009 Nobel Prize lecture
. Poor Charles was too debilitated by Alzheimer's disease to give the talk himself! But if you've got a pulse, you can get the prize, so all good.
Amit Singhal by Ciro Santilli 37 Updated 2025-07-16
Pitched OurBigBook.com to him:
Idea: make all Sitare University materials open, and allow students to write the content
Also, allow anyone to take the exams without enrolling (possibly for a fee if they don't have scholarship).
This is the way to go if you really want to increase your impact/dollar and do something truly innovative that ill make a mark. Why just mirror existing university models that haven't yet caught up to the Internet Age?
satoshi@vistomail.com by Ciro Santilli 37 Updated 2025-07-16
One of Satoshi's email addresses, it's how he made the First public announcement of Bitoin on first public announcement of Bitcoin on 2008-10-31.
At some point later on vistomail.com was discontinued and acquired by a super dodgy dude, Alex Elbanna, so it hasn't been Satoshi for a while.
vistomail.com by Ciro Santilli 37 Updated 2025-07-16
2023-11-17 bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5478677.0 "I Bought vistomail.com. Now What?" Restricted topic, but Google caught it: archive.ph/wip/dDxqi The message:
I am dedicating the next few months, and perhaps even years, to researching Satoshi Nakamoto and the intricacies of blockchain technology. About four weeks ago, I came across vistomail.com for sale on afternic.com and decided to purchase it. I added vistomail.com to my proton.me account and configured it to catch all emails. As a result, numerous emails started flowing in. Subsequently, I connected satoshi@vistomail.com and discovered significant information that I am excited to share with you in the coming months.
To be clear, I want to emphasize that I am not Satoshi Nakamoto. My interest lies in understanding the future plans for Bitcoin and its impact on the world. I invite you to join me on this journey, contributing your knowledge to the collective understanding. I believe there is a possibility of uncovering the ultimate treasure, and I am eager to share it with all of you.
twitter @alexelbanna
2023-11-17, 06:46:25 PM. bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5474482.0 vistomail.com for sale, Restricted topic, but Google caught it: archive.ph/wip/GARBy The message:
Vistomail.com has a rich Bitcoin history with Satoshi Nakamoto, the creator of Bitcoin.
Email address: satoshi@vistomail.com
$50,000 obo for vistomail.com. Buy Now: www.afternic.com/listings/778206
How it would be of value:
You would open a proton.me account add domain vistomail.com. Then you create an address such as: satoshi@vistomail.com and the you can set the domain to a catch all address. All satoshi@vistomail.com emails will come into your inbox. All emails from @vistomail.com going to vistomail.com will now be in your inbox.
Michael Weber
Domain Registrar
mweber@dosidos.net
As of 2024-04-03, it was parked again on GoDaddy, and emails were bouncing.
As of 2024-04-10, it was now a Ghost blogging intance still by Alex: www.vistomail.com/articles-coming-soon/ He added Ciro Santilli as a collaborator, but Ciro could only draft articles which Alex could then review. He allowed a cheeky link to OurBigBook.com in: archive.ph/8l6az epic. Let's see if it gives traffic!
www.vistomail.com/non-profits/ claims they were giving out grants via satoshin@nt-medic.com and provided address 1BCwUg3PsLK9wJK815RkmzSMdAnALNHu64
Figure 1.
Wayback Machine archive of https://www.vistomail.com/Default.aspx on 2013-12-09
. Source.

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