Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1496727
70 DESIGN007 MAGAZINE I APRIL 2023 Catalyzing Change and Design Evolution Electronics have wormed their way into our daily lives in ways few of us could ever have imagined. In their early days, especially post- World War II through the 1950s, electronics were largely used to entertain us—the sound of radio and the pictures of television. ose two drivers have clearly not gone away; if any- thing, they are woven into our lives by inter- net and smartphone technologies where sound and images demand our attention nearly every waking moment. Today, the so-called metaverse seeks to blur the lines between reality and fantasy. ings that were pure speculation and pipe dreams in the late 1960s, such as the Star Trek communi- cators, are now physically manifest in our daily lives. e source of these developments has been the unfettered imagination of countless visionaries within the electronics industry. The Desire for Change Change, or the search for and openness to it, will arguably be a cornerstone of the elec- tronics industry. It is the fuel that runs the global economic engine; as economists have observed, this growth is predicated on change and is based on the axiom that success of an economy is founded on the notion that an individual's wants must exceed their needs. If we collectively lose our appetites for change, everything grinds to a halt. e electronics industry is continuously being pressured to develop newer and better products with more functions and at lower Flexible Thinking by Joe Fjelstad, VERDANT ELECTRONICS