i just missed it but yesterday was the birthday of Jerry Lawson, a self taught electronics hobbyist and genius who designed the Fairchild Channel F in 1976: the first home video games console to use removable cartridges. his influence on the industry is impossible to overstate.
and he designed an 8-way joystick AND the first pause button for a game console! did you know he also used to build walkie talkies and sell them as a child? what a god.
even though his work on the Channel F is probably the thing that most effects the average person here, he had quite a life/career; here's an interesting interview with the man a couple of years before his too-early death in 2011.
