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  2. /Story
  3. /50th Anniversary of BitBLT
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  3. /50th Anniversary of BitBLT
Nov 19, 2025 at 9:47 PM EST

50th Anniversary of BitBLT

todsacerdoti
72 points
13 comments

Mood

calm

Sentiment

positive

Category

tech

Key topics

Bitblt

Graphics

Computing History

Software Development

Celebrating the 50th anniversary of Bitblt, a significant graphics operation.

Snapshot generated from the HN discussion

Discussion Activity

Active discussion

First comment

15h

Peak period

11

Day 1

Avg / period

11

Comment distribution11 data points
Loading chart...

Based on 11 loaded comments

Key moments

  1. 01Story posted

    Nov 19, 2025 at 9:47 PM EST

    4d ago

    Step 01
  2. 02First comment

    Nov 20, 2025 at 12:26 PM EST

    15h after posting

    Step 02
  3. 03Peak activity

    11 comments in Day 1

    Hottest window of the conversation

    Step 03
  4. 04Latest activity

    Nov 20, 2025 at 7:50 PM EST

    3d ago

    Step 04

Generating AI Summary...

Analyzing up to 500 comments to identify key contributors and discussion patterns

Discussion (13 comments)
Showing 11 comments of 13
ChrisArchitect
3d ago
3 replies
Happy BitBLT Day to all who celebrate https://www.jwz.org/blog/2025/11/happy-bitblt-day-to-all-who...
trollbridge
3d ago
1 reply
Reminder to right-click, click "Get Clean Link", then open a new tab and paste to avoid jwz's anti-HN referral tracker.
ChrisArchitect
3d ago
oh, uh, can jump from mastodon then where I copied the link from, sorry https://mastodon.social/@jwz/115578171906975865
HappyPanacea
3d ago
3 replies
What does this guy have against HN?
rjsw
3d ago
Worked for too many VCs.
agumonkey
3d ago
first time i get "*ickrolled" on HN
kragen
3d ago
Didn't you read the page? "A venture capital company's fan club. Finance-obsessed man-children making the world worse." A previous version said, "A DDoS made of finance-obsessed man-children and brogrammers."
kristianp
3d ago
He refers to byte magazine's article on bitblt: https://archive.org/details/byte-magazine-1981-08/page/n185/...

Also XScreensaver's Blitspin hack: https://archive.org/details/byte-magazine-1981-08/page/n201/...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTtcwb-UWW8

snvzz
3d ago
A routine often used for intellectual property theft*.

It will copy any image, irrespective of the copyright owners' desire.

*copyright infringement.

lalalandland
3d ago
Interview with Dan Ingalls here where he talks about inventing BitBlt

www.computerhistory.org/collections/catalog/102738237/

uticus
3d ago
First time I heard of BitBLT was the Win-11-breaking-ColorForth discussion at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45953001

2 more comments available on Hacker News

View full discussion on Hacker News
ID: 45988278Type: storyLast synced: 11/22/2025, 8:19:14 AM

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