Makers of MAKE 133
BoredStiff writes "An NPR show called The Connection inteviewed The Makers of MAKE.
They discussed who's behind MAKE magazine, and why they think there are a lot of people out there with an interest in re-inventing with the
gadgets that run our daily lives. MAKE magazine is a deliberate throw-back to the how-to science manuals of an
earlier era -- back when technology wasn't so cheap people did more 'do it yourself.'"
Re:Why pay? (Score:3, Insightful)
Seems another case of retro-mania (Score:3, Insightful)
I grew up reading do-it-yourself books, encyclopedias, magazines (especially Popular Science and Popular Mechanics of the 50s, 60s, and 70s saved by family). Casting aluminum myself was childs play given I went to school with kids who built calculators out of discrete components in elementary school. Do-it-yourself was just what we did. It wasn't different than catching carp yourself instead of pestering mom and dad to buy them for the tank, or sometimes pond you made with a shovel and hose.
Looking this over, I'll probably eventually get around to subscribing. If only American schools of today put more emphasis on the basics that allow us to build more complicated technology. Wood shop, metal shop, auto, electronics, so many are now cut to nothing no matter the administration being right (the basics are reading, writing, math, history) or left (the basics are sociopolitics, emotions, and safety which precludes hands-on anything). People should know how to build the machines they use in case they ever do need to make them.
Maybe I'll buy a couple subscriptions for my local schools.
When I was a little boy... (Score:5, Insightful)
These books had *everything* from simple things like making your own arc-lamp to radios, to steam engines, to stirling-cycle engines, to lightweight gasoline airplane engines ( for free flight ) to chassis for a go-kart, to simple transmissions, to making your own lathe, and so on. Plus, a *lot* of pyrotechnics. A LOT of pyrotechnics.
All gorgeously illustrated in the clean slightly-post-art-nouveau style of the 20's, with little boys and teenagers doing things that would get you arrested today.
What broke my heart were paragraphs that would say "Just go to your local chemist's and buy 12 pounds of insert-highly-toxic-explosive-compound". I'd ask my dad and say, "where can I get insert-highly-toxic-explosive-compound". He'd say, "Son, we live in a pussy age where you'd get arrested for just asking about that stuff."
I guess this is how we grow up today. Sterile, hairless wimps.
Re:my inlaws (Score:5, Insightful)
I used to be a DIY type, making homebrew beer, DIY beer coolers, DIY fish "pond" (in my dorm room) with DIY biological filter, etc. Several years after college if finally occured to me that what I made was invariably more expensive, less effective/efficient, bigger and just plain uglier than the commercially produced equivalents. And so I quit. (I still subscribed to MAKE when it was first published)
I think the point of DIY is being creative in solving problems, to be inventive, to have a sense of accomplishment when something is made. "I did that" instead of "I bought that." It is something that any DIYer can appreciate himself, even if no one around him does.
On a distantly related note, I fear there may be a decline in ingenuity in general, as mass produced fare is so cheap and so readily available that few people feel the urge to fiddle, to improve anything, since they can just go out and buy something else.
I'm currently mulling over a project to convert an optical mouse into a DIY (right) foot operated computer pointer with (left) foot operated pedals instead of buttons. I know there are commercial products that do this ($130-$200+) but they aren't _exactly_ what I envision.