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1932: Space adventurer Buck Rogers debuts on CBS radio. The science fiction show, eventually called Buck Rogers in the 25th Century, will delight loyal fans over a span of 15 years and inspire aficionados for decades more.

Writer Phil Nowlan unveiled space swashbuckler Buck Rogers in a story called "Armageddon — 2419," which was published in Amazing Stories magazine in August 1928. Nowlan collaborated with John F. Dille and Dick Calkins on a newspaper comic strip that started Jan. 7, 1929.

The radio show, originally named The World in 2432, featured Buck, co-pilot Wilma Deering — a woman aviator or rocketeer was an advanced concept for the 1930s — and genius scientist Dr. Huer, fighting evildoers 500 years in the future. The trio relied on futuristic weapons like death rays, incendiary missiles, gamma bombs and a mechanical mole, among others.

Sound effects made these all come across with dramatic impact. Buck's psychic destruction ray was really a Schick electric razor held at just the right distance from the microphone. The sound effects crew could also simulate anything from a regiment of marching robots to a scary rocket-ship crash.

The show debuted the night before Franklin D. Roosevelt trounced incumbent President Herbert Hoover in the presidential election. It was an instant hit, in no small measure due to the premiums listeners could get by sending in cereal boxtops or other proofs of purchase. Gifts included a map of the planets, a cardboard space helmet and Big Little Books (3-5/8 inches by 4-1/2 inches) of Buck Rogers comics.

The 15-minute serial ran Monday through Thursday evenings, from Nov. 7, 1932, to May 22, 1936, on CBS. It was revived as a thrice-weekly, 15-minute series on the Mutual Broadcasting System from April 5 to July 31, 1939, and then as a half-hour Saturday show on Mutual from May 18 to July 27, 1940. The show had its final radio incarnation Sept. 30, 1946, to March 28, 1947, as 15-minute episodes weekdays on Mutual.

Sponsors over the years included Kellogg's, Cocomalt, Cream of Wheat and Popsicles, Fudgsicles and Creamsicles. Calkins was a writer on the show, along with Joe Cross, Albert G. Miller and producer-director Jack Johnstone. Over the years, four different actors played Buck and two did Wilma.

Buck's popularity also inspired some other comic strips and radio and television shows, notably Flash Gordon and Tom Corbett Space Cadet.

Buck also appeared in a 12-episode 1939 movie serial starring Buster Crabbe, a 1950-51 TV series and the Buck Rogers in the 25th Century television series that ran for 24 episodes in the 1979-80 season and another 13 in 1981. The newspaper comic strip ended its run in 1967.

Source: Various

Anthony "Buck" Rogers first burst from writer Philip Nowlan's imagination in 1928, when the intrepid spaceman appeared in "Armageddon — 2419," a story published in Amazing Stories magazine.

From his pulp roots, the character developed into an influential American hero on the airwaves and the silver screen. Subsequent space swashbucklers like Brick Bradford and Flash Gordon took a cue from Buck Rogers' sci-fi adventures.

Buck took to the radio Nov. 7, 1932, with the first broadcast of The World in 2432. The radio show launched Buck and his female co-pilot, Wilma Deering, into the nation's living rooms, introducing such sci-fi staples as spaceships and death rays.

Take a look at the 25th century in this gallery of images showing various incarnations of Buck Rogers over the years.

Left: Nowlan's hero makes his second appearance in Amazing Stories, this time landing on the cover of the March 1929 issue.

The Buck Rogers in the 25th Century comic strip debuted Jan. 7, 1929, with a Sunday page appearing a year later. The strip, which was initially written by Nowlan and drawn by Dick Calkins, appeared in more than 400 newspapers around the world at the height of its popularity. It didn't stop running until 1967.

In the strips as well as the Amazing Stories novellas, Buck Rogers is a World War I veteran, a former U.S. Air Service pilot who is later trapped by a mine cave-in and put in suspended animation by radioactive gas.

After 500 years, he awakens to save America from "Mongol" invaders and other enemies.

This cover graced a licensed, full-color reissue of a rare Buck Rogers in the 25th Century book. The original was printed in 1933 and distributed as a breakfast-cereal premium.

This publicity photo plugged the original Buck Rogers radio show.

Voice actors Matt Crowley, Curtis Arnall, Carl Frank and John Larkin brought Buck to life during the show's 15-year run. Adele Ronson played Buck's co-pilot, Wilma Dearing, and Edgar Stehli portrayed scientist-inventor Dr. Huer.

1939's 12-part Buck Rogers serial film thrust Buster Crabbe into the title role. Universal Pictures mined the comic strip for inspiration, but changed Buck's origin story.

In the movie version, Buck and George "Buddy" Wade crash a dirigible over the North Pole, but survive thanks to experimental "Nirvano Gas," which keeps them alive for 500 years after an avalanche.

Buck Rogers and his fellow space adventurers inspired toy ray guns in seemingly endless variety.

Jackie Moran, left, played George "Buddy" Wade in the 1939 serial film Buck Rogers. Former Flash Gordon star Buster Crabbe played the title role.

In the Buck Rogers in the 25th Century television show, Buck was a NASA pilot frozen for five centuries after a malfunction by his space shuttle's life-support system. Again, he is miraculously revived in the 25th century.

The TV show borrowed from producer Glen A. Larson's previous show, Battlestar Galactica, and attempted to cash in on the success of Star Wars. The show ran from 1979 to 1981 on NBC.

Actor Gilbert "Gil" Gerard played the space hero in the 1979-81 Buck Rogers in the 25th Century television series.

Actress Erin Gray played Col. Wilma Deering in the 1979-81 Buck Rogers in the 25th Century TV show.

In the 1979-81 television series, Buck Rogers got a robotic sidekick named Twiki.

A radio-controlled Twiki toy surely frightened a child or two in the early '80s.

Like other sci-fi shows of the era, the Buck Rogers TV series spawned action figures.

Sega brought Buck into the arcades with 1982's space-shooter videogame Buck Rogers: Planet of Zoom.

See also:

When Sony released the first Walkman in 1979, it changed the way music lovers saw the world. Suddenly everything around us played to whatever soundtrack we created, emotionally augmenting otherwise mundane experiences.

The iPod in 2001 brought more headphone wanderers into the fold with its monolithic success, but for many, it's not the musical companion of choice. Some of our readers' submissions took the 'portable music player' topic a little loosely, but here are some of our favorites.

Left: Archos Jukebox
Submitted by Brad Hodges

Photographer's comment:

"In preparation for several years in Central Africa, I bought this device long before MP3 players were commonplace. Boasting one of the first internal hard drives (20 GB) and a built-in recorder, it was a source of entertainment for an entire African village during three years in the tropical rainforest. I returned to the U.S., then spent a cold winter in Canada with it. Back in the U.S. again, it's still my favorite MP3 player, despite its small screen and amazing simplicity.�

Sony D-88
Submitted by Jason Sewell

Photographer's comment:

"The Sony D-88 blew my mind when I first saw it. As far as I know, this is the only CD player with a footprint smaller than a compact disc. Two-thirds of the disc stuck out of the player. And if you could find any of the smaller CDs, you could actually reposition the spindle so that the entire disc fit inside the player."

"The first" portable music player, early 30s
Submitted by PAOMAG

Photographer's comment:

"Early Columbia portable with 'automatic' louvres. There is a further subdivision of portable machines, which takes in the many novelty miniature and folding gramophones, particularly popular in the late 1920s, but still being made in the 1950s. Some collectors collect nothing but these novelties, of which there are dozens of variations."

AM/FM Headphone Radio
Submitted by Ian

Photographer's comment:

"Remember these? I guess lightning-risk awareness was not an issue at that time."

DataPlay Mini-DVD Player by iRiver iDP-100 Submitted by Jacquie Dutton

Photographer's comment:

"It coulda been someone … it coulda been a contender ... there were two devices and two dozen albums ready to ship to stores. Then DataPlay went bankrupt. Everyone ran. Flash memory came down in price. And Apple did something unthinkable: It incorporated nearly obsolete small form-factor hard drives — a commodity — into something HOT. But the secret sauce is always the software, and iTunes had the winning recipe.â€�

mobiBLU b153
Submitted by Jake

Photographer's comment:

"It wasn't pretty, but it got the job done. The mobiBLU b153 had voice recording, a customizable equalizer, an FM radio and more. It was cheap at the time, too: 2 GB for only $120. The kicker, though, was its 153 hours of battery life."

Boom Box
Submitted by Sam

Photographer's comment:

"Eight D-cell batteries guaranteed three hours of use on or off the basketball courts!"

Diamond Rio PMP300
Submitted by Anonymous

Photographer's comment:

"You kids and your flash players with USB ports and SD slots … this is the great granddaddy of all of your new small players, the original 32-MB Diamond Rio. Connected through the parallel port, ran on one AA, and if you had the money for some flash, could be expanded with SmartMedia. Who cares about the 17th anniversary of the iPod? We should be more concerned about the 10th anniversary of the first portable MP3 player to see any success at all.�

Portable music in a big way
Submitted by Not Anon

Photographer's comment:

"Seriously, the thing was the size of a brick. Owned one before my Zune. Loved the thing. Still miss the Rio DJ feature."

XM Helix by Samsung
Submitted by Anonymous

Photographer's comment:

"It's like a self-loading iPod and I'm not paying $1/song. I have a home cradle to listen through my surround system, and set it to record overnight. Next day, I put it in my car cradle, and listen to live tunes w/o ads; buh-bye FM. At work, I listen to saved music on 15 hrs battery. I edit the stuff recorded the night before, lock in the good and skip the bad. Cap: ~850 songs. When I hear something good on live broadcast, I hit REC and it's mine!"

Sansa slotMusic Player
Submitted by Mike Kabala

Photographer's comment:

"Even though most people are calling it a doomed format, I love my Sansa slotMusic player, shown here with an optional cover that lets me carry up to three additional micro SD or slotMusic cards. I enjoy being able to create custom playlists that I can listen to by simply plugging in a card and pressing 'Play,' rather than having to mess with menus or even look at a screen."

Sony MPD-AP20U, the CD/DVD player and CD writer that played MP3 DVDs!!
Submitted by Anonymous

Photographer's comment:

"Supported media: DVD-ROM, DVD-Video, DVD-R, DVD+R, DVD-RW, DVD+RW, CD-ROM, CD-ROM XA, Photo CD, CD Text, Video CD, CD-DA, CD Extra, CD-R, CD-RW. Additional media: Memory Stick Reader/Writer (Purple Stick). Write methods: Track-at-once, Disk-at-once, Session-at-once, Fixed packet writing. Write speed: CD-R Write: 4X, 8X, 8~24X Z-CLV max.; CD-RW Write: 4X, 8X, 10X max. Memory Stick: 1.5MB/s."

Sony Walkman Sports Edition (radio and cassette player)
Submitted by Michael

Photographer's comment:

"It might be missing a few dials and buttons, but it's been with me for a long time (through art school and my many travels) and still works.... (Sony really missed the bus on the MP3 player, IMO.)"

Soundwagon: Smallest Record Player Ever
Submitted by Martin

Photographer's comment:

"I used to carry this (soundwagon) around with me so I could drop it on a record in weird, dusty old record shops that didn't let you listen to the goods. I'm sure it's the worst ever for a record ... but it works."

Toshiba XR-P9 Portable/Dockable CD Player, circa 1986
Submitted by Anonymous

Photographer's comment:

"When I saw this page, I went to the basement and dug out my original XR-P9 (long non-functional). Seems I have the full kit: original leather-ette carry case with battery pack (6 C cells!), IR receiver and remote.

The power wedge slides off for use with the case.

My first CD player, chosen and loved for its versatility. Found this pic on eBay, but you get the idea...."

Xclef
Submitted by Jon

Photographer's comment:

"The Xclef is a dream for those of us who know how to build our own systems. I put my own 100-GB drive in there (standard laptop-sized drive), and can swap it out if I want. I can offload it and load onto it from Mac and PC, and the built-in equalizer sounds so much better than anything else I've heard. I wish they didn't stop making this because it truly is an amazing player."

The original Zen Touch
Submitted by Anonymous

Photographer's comment:

"The coolest MP3 player at the time, better sound quality then the iPod, etc...."

If you've left your house in the past 10 years, chances are good that you've been wronged by someone on a cellphone. And, let's admit it, you've probably also wronged someone else. Whether it's chatting through your coffee purchase or cutting someone off on the freeway, cellphone use can turn the best of us into a-holes faster than you can say "Can you hear me now?"

We want to see photos of ridiculous cellphone use in an Ode to Rudeness. Help us shine a light on this modern jackassery.

Use the Reddit widget below to submit your best flagrant cellphone-use photo and vote for your favorite among the other submissions. If we like your photo, we'll include it in a gallery on Wired.com.

The photo must be your own, and by submitting it you are giving us permission to use it on Wired.com and in Wired magazine. Please submit images that are relatively large, the ideal size being 800 to 1200 pixels or larger on the longest side. Please include a description of your photo so that other readers know what they're looking at.

We don't host the photos, so you'll have to upload it somewhere else and submit a link to it. If you're using Flickr, Picasa or another photo-sharing site to host your image, please provide a link to the image directly and not just to the photo page where it's displayed. Using an online photo service that requires that you log in will not work. If your photo doesn't show up, it's because the URL you have entered is incorrect. Check it and make sure it ends with the image file name (XXXXXX.jpg).

Please bookmark this page, send it to your friends and check back periodically over the next two weeks to vote on new submissions!

Show photos that are: hot | new | top-rated. Submit your flagrant cellphone-use photo.

(No more than one every 30 minutes. No HTML allowed.)

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1928: The New York Times begins flashing headlines to pedestrians outside its offices at 1 Times Square, using an electronic news strip that wraps around the fourth floor of the building.

The Motograph News Bulletin, or "zipper" as it was known informally, was a technological marvel of its day. It extended 380 feet around the Times Tower and, with a band 5-feet tall, the moving letters were visible from a distance of several city blocks.

A Times column from 2005 described how inventor Frank C. Reilly's remarkable sign worked:

Inside the control room, three cables poured energy into transformers. The hookup to all the bulbs totaled 88,000 soldered connections. Messages from a ticker came to a desk beside a cabinet like the case that contained type used by old-time compositors. The cabinet contained thin slabs called letter elements. An operator composed the message letter-by-letter in a frame.

The frame, when filled with the letters and spaces that spelled out a news item, was inserted in a magazine at one end of a track. A chain conveyor moved the track, and each letter in the frame brushed a number of contacts. Each contact set a light flashing on Broadway.

Reilly, the Times said, calculated that there were 261,925,664 flashes an hour from the zipper's 14,800 bulbs.

It was the first use anywhere of the zipper, which was itself big news on a big news day. A headline in the Nov. 6 edition of the Times declared: Huge Times Sign Will Flash News. It also happened to be election day, and the zipper's first streaming headline announced a new president: HERBERT HOOVER DEFEATS AL SMITH

Less than a year later, the zipper would be flashing the collapse of the stock market and the events that brought on the Great Depression.

Throughout the 20th century, historic moments became frozen as zipper headlines in the national consciousness:

PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT IS DEAD

OFFICIAL: TRUMAN ANNOUNCES JAPANESE SURRENDER

PRESIDENT KENNEDY SHOT DEAD IN DALLAS

MAN ON MOON

NIXON RESIGNS

In between monumental news events, the zipper kept churning out the headlines, which later included weather forecasts and sports scores.

Even before the advent of the zipper, Times Square was a mighty crossroads, home to theaters and restaurants that kept the district humming 24 hours a day. Illuminated signs began springing up with such profusion that even in the early 1900s Broadway and Times Square were referred to as The Great White Way. The first neon sign in Times Square -- advertising the automaker Willys-Overland -- appeared in 1924. But the zipper, with its streaming headlines, was something new and arresting.

When the Times left 1 Times Square in 1963 for its new building on West 43rd Street, New York Newsday took over running the zipper. But as modern Times Square gradually vanished into an orgy of commerce, punctuated by garish neon and LED displays that make midnight feel like high noon, technology had clearly passed the zipper by.

Newsday was ready to pull the plug in 1994, but the zipper was saved when a British company picked up the lease at the midnight hour. As 1 Times Square, like every other building in the area, was gradually buried in an avalanche of modern signage, the old zipper was acquired by Dow Jones and given a complete face lift.

What was once the Motograph News Bulletin is now one of several high-resolution displays on Times Square, distinguishable from the others only by the use of amber LEDs.

Source: Various