Q 01/05

Which teacher of the deaf was awarded the first US patent for the telephone in 1876?

A) Johann Philipp Reis

B) Thomas Edison

C) Alexander Graham Bell

D) Antonio Meucci

Answer · why

C) Alexander Graham Bell

Alexander Graham Bell got the telephone working three days after the patent was issued, calling his assistant in from the next room. His study of spee...

Q 02/05

Which short-range wireless technology is named after a tenth-century Danish king called Harald?

A) Zigbee

B) Bluetooth

C) Z-Wave

D) Wireless USB

Answer · why

B) Bluetooth

Bluetooth was the nickname of King Harald, who united Denmark's tribes much as the technology was meant to unite devices. Its logo merges the runes fo...

Q 03/05

Which greeting was the world's first SMS text message, sent by engineer Neil Papworth in 1992?

A) Happy New Year

B) Season's Greetings

C) Happy Holidays

D) Merry Christmas

Answer · why

D) Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas was typed on a personal computer, not a phone, and sent over Vodafone's network to the Orbitel 901 handset of a colleague, Richard Jar...

Q 04/05

Which distress signal is sent in Morse code as three dots, three dashes and three dots?

A) SOS

B) Mayday

C) CQD

D) QRT

Answer · why

A) SOS

SOS was adopted in 1906 purely as a rhythm that was hard to mistake, so it originally stood for nothing at all. The letters were only a handy way to r...

Q 05/05

Which Hollywood star co-patented a frequency-hopping radio guidance system for torpedoes in 1942?

A) Marlene Dietrich

B) Hedy Lamarr

C) Ingrid Bergman

D) Greta Garbo

Answer · why

B) Hedy Lamarr

Hedy Lamarr worked out the jam-proof scheme with composer George Antheil, drawing on his experience of synchronising player pianos. Frequency hopping ...