DE Rebranded As Democracy Everywhere (April Fools)

Note: This post was an April Fools’ joke. I’d like to thank Noah Cole, Beth Ambaruch, and Jim Brown for joining me in the spirit of humor and issuing quotes to support my post. We now go back to regularly scheduled blog posts.—Kenneth

Eighteen years after its launch in 1995, DE, is revising its brand to reflect the changing climate of engineering. Today, the magazine announces it’s changing its name from Desktop Engineering to Democracy Everywhere. The change is reflected in the magazine’s new logo that incorporates a ballot box.

The magazine’s cofounders decided to keep the new name within the existing acronym, DE, as their dedication to design reuse. In a closed-door voting session among its editorial staff, Democracy Everywhere beat out the other two proposals, Digital Entertainment and Do-It-Yourself Engineering, by a majority vote.

Noah Cole, Autodesk’s senior manager for corporate communications, noted, “For over 30 years, Autodesk has been focused on democratizing design technology, so we welcome this new name and editorial direction for DE magazine.”

Beth Ambaruch, PTC’s director of corporate communications, reacted similarly. “This new brand and mission make much sense as we all know engineering is no longer constrained to the desktop. It’s up to engineers around the world to bring design democracy to a global audience. I love it,” she remarked.

Jim Brown, industry analyst and president of Tech-Clarity, observed, “I am fully supportive of the transition. For too long the engineering software industry has focused exclusively on discussions about tool to help conceptualize, design, and product physical goods. The new mission of DE is much more in line with the holistic nature of our society, recognizing that without social and political well-being in the world, high-value products is of little benefit other than corporate profits and providing consumers with items to help them overlook unpleasant world affairs. Bravo to the brave new world DE sets out to champion!”

Virtual Desktop, the blog associated with the magazine, will also be rebranded as Virtu Democratia, Latin for Virtual Democracy. In upcoming blog posts, blogger Kenneth Wong will explore how free design software, cloud-hosted data management products, mobile devices, and social media helped spawn the Arab Spring and the transition to democracy in his homeland, Burma.