Excellent article, Mr. Hacker :)

>ASML started off life within Philips, the Dutch consumer electronics giant.

Who started with light bulbs which were using the electrons for direct visual and UI/UX purposes. Some of the most simple electronic components, but quite a bit like appliances themselves. No surprise a lamp in English means either a bulb, an appliance, or both.

Vacuum tubes were the next step up in complexity and I guess you can take it from there.

In the early radio days it didn't take too many "ampules" to make a radio. Not nearly as complex as a cellphone, but bizarrely more complicated than a light bulb already.

The Edison Effect turned out to be a very strong force after all :)

At one time every building that had electronics, had vacuum tubes. When you moved a radio or TV set, you were carrying your own little vacuum chambers with you from place to place, even as late as CRT's.

With solid-state electronics like this, the vacuum chambers are much bigger, but are only located in a centralized factory process, so you don't have to carry them around with you if you want to be portable.

You wouldn't want to anyway, look how heavy they have gotten ;)