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Moore’s Law
Book

Moore’s Law

The Life of Gordon Moore, Silicon Valley’s Quiet Revolutionary

Basic Books, 2015 more...

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Editorial Rating

8

Qualities

  • Innovative
  • Engaging
  • Inspiring

Recommendation

Technology pioneer Gordon Moore, the originator of Moore’s Law, may not be as famous as his axiom, but he should be. The “technology godfather of Silicon Valley,” Moore reshaped the modern world. This big, authoritative biography tells Moore’s story from his 1929 birth in Pescadero, California – near what would become Silicon Valley – to his time as founder, chairman and CEO of Intel Corporation, the world’s leading semiconductor manufacturer. getAbstract recommends this well-researched biography to anyone intrigued by the humble but brilliant scientist, the pioneering chemist and the electronics entrepreneur who helped create the high-tech world.

Summary

Moore’s Law

On April 19, 1965, in its 35th anniversary edition, Electronics magazine ran an article, “Cramming More Components onto Integrated Circuits,” by Fairchild Semiconductor’s Gordon Moore, a brilliant chemist and technician. Moore postulated that microchip complexity – the number of transistors a silicon microchip contains – would double every year or so as manufacturing costs continually decreased. This is Moore’s Law, the “central theorem of the digital age.” Moore wrote that miniaturization and lower costs of transistors would combine with an exponential increase in power to transform the world.

Since that article, computing expenses have shrunk drastically and electronic component costs have dropped “more than a billionfold.” Silicon chip technology drives computers, TVs, radios, smartphones, automobiles, airplanes, equipment, video gaming, the Internet, the cloud and robotics. The silicon-based transistors that Moore helped pioneer are the most manufactured products in the world and the most essential components of modern life. Moore’s article did not get much notice at the time of its publication, but eventually, everyone recognized its wisdom...

About the Authors

Arnold Thackray is founding CEO of the Chemical Heritage Foundation. David C. Brock is an electronics authority. Journalist Rachel Jones specializes in technology and entrepreneurship.


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