Are we an isolated group among the masses?
Oldbitcollector (Jeff)
Posts: 8,091
Living in small town, it's a treat when I drive to one of the other larger cities nearby
and have opportunity to visit some offerings not presented in Podunk.
I stopped in to Borders tonight to see if they had the latest copy of Make, and peruse
the shelves. {Noticing that Parallax is grabbing lot of back cover magazine space these days}
After much searching I finally located the very thin selection {about 10 books} of electronics/microcontroller
books. What a total disappointment! One PIC book, a generic sensor book, and a handful of general
electronics offerings. Zero Robotics books, zero basic experimenting books. I would have even
been pleased to see the "famed" junkbots book!
I know that I can order ANYTHING I want from places online like Parallax, or Amazon, but it's nice to
be able to walk into a real "brick and mortar" store and walk out with something in the bag.
All this being said, I'm curious, are we such an isolated group from the masses who buy the latest
Steven King novel, or is it that I do truly live in a country which has classified science/technology
as something uncool and/or negative stereotyping of geeks. Are the offerings abroad a little more
to your liking?
OBC
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and have opportunity to visit some offerings not presented in Podunk.
I stopped in to Borders tonight to see if they had the latest copy of Make, and peruse
the shelves. {Noticing that Parallax is grabbing lot of back cover magazine space these days}
After much searching I finally located the very thin selection {about 10 books} of electronics/microcontroller
books. What a total disappointment! One PIC book, a generic sensor book, and a handful of general
electronics offerings. Zero Robotics books, zero basic experimenting books. I would have even
been pleased to see the "famed" junkbots book!
I know that I can order ANYTHING I want from places online like Parallax, or Amazon, but it's nice to
be able to walk into a real "brick and mortar" store and walk out with something in the bag.
All this being said, I'm curious, are we such an isolated group from the masses who buy the latest
Steven King novel, or is it that I do truly live in a country which has classified science/technology
as something uncool and/or negative stereotyping of geeks. Are the offerings abroad a little more
to your liking?
OBC
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New to the Propeller?
Getting started with a Propeller Protoboard?
Check out: Introduction to the Proboard & Propeller Cookbook 1.4
Updates to the Cookbook are now posted to: Propeller.warrantyvoid.us
Got an SD card connected? - PropDOS
Comments
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Pi Guy
Anyway, here at college, everyone seems amazed at the slightest hint of electronics. I offer to loan out my Parallax Books, but nobody has seriously taken it up yet... I guess I going solo.
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Pi Guy
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www.fd.com.my
www.mercedes.com.my
This needs loads of effort, money and time. I show the things I do to my gf, she says well that is nice. I explain how it works, or what it is and she sorts of understands (we are both chemists) but grabbing an soldering iron and putting something together... well I did not find that one yet (a free one, I mean, I met one girl that wanted to learn to solder but was already married and her husband did not wanted teach her to solder, because she would have probably done it better than him!).
When I was in high-school, we where a few the ones who did something, some hobby I mean, and electronics was the most popular, among 5 or 6 in the whole class. I still keep it, I mean, it is mostly what I want to do
The only people I've met for a couple of decades now who are interested in electronics as a hobby are generally musicians who want to build weird distortion gadgets for there electric guitars.
What happened to all the ham radio types.
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For me, the past is not over yet.
I have actually brought this up a time or two in the past.
What is this country / world coming to when only about 2% (if that) of the books in the book stores are about the sciences ?
It just goes that show that the masses are more interested in being entertained than in actually learning anything, or creating anything.
This REALLY has me concerned about the future...
Another thing I've noticed is that I've tried to teach several people how to play guitar (I've been playing for years just as a hobby). They think in a couple hours they will be able to play whatever they want. They think I'm crazy when I tell them it took me about a year to really be able to play decent. After a couple lessons and no practice, they give up saying it's too hard.
Welcome to the world of constant entertainment and instant gradification.
I wish I could find some people in my area (Harrisburg PA) that are interested in electronics too. But I guess this forum is the next best thing...
Bean
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"The welfare of the people in particular has always been the alibi of tyrants." ~ Camus
www.iElectronicDesigns.com
·
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"It just goes that show that the masses are more interested in being entertained than in actually learning anything, or creating anything."
·
That pretty much sums it up right there.· I think that we have become "top heavy" and forgotten or simply don't care about the foundation holding us up.
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Beau Schwabe
IC Layout Engineer
Parallax, Inc.
Our main national newsagent chain does however stock Elektor and Everyday Practical Electronics plus a few Ham magazines. We do have a few online suppliers of components but little on the high street - Tandy closed down years ago while Maplin stores are not what they used to be and only seem to supply a limited range of Microchip processors.
My local library is a little better on the electronics front with a few RA Penfold books - our British version of Forrest M Mims III.
John Abshier
My work with them resulted in a lot of interest. By the time they hit high school it is expected that I offer a complete robotics lab.
But it's still tough. These demos still compete with video games and other instant-satisfaction things, even with my own kids. They often have the expectation that they can build a robot quickly - something they get from video games.
As for the topical question posed by OBC, it's the same where I live. The industries of interest include tourism, real estate, and other similar businesses. There's a single RadioShack that still sells phones and other consumer stuff (only a few components) and I need to drive two hours to hit a major electronics store (Fry's).
I realize that OBC's question didn't pertain specifically to the USA, but it's clear our country and those where our customers live best put our innovative spirit back on top soon. That should be easy to do since real estate and finance have collapsed in the USA. Else our standard of living shall steadily decline.
Ken Gracey
Parallax, Inc.
A ray of hope in darkness! That's got to be right up there with the highlights of
your week when you do that! Being a former vocational teacher, I've got to ask
Do you also get involved with your local vocational schools?
Discouraging to hear that it's like this outside the US too..
OBC
@Bean: After five years and hundreds of hours practicing, I'm still a chord player.
(Fun though) [noparse]:)[/noparse]
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New to the Propeller?
Getting started with a Propeller Protoboard?
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Updates to the Cookbook are now posted to: Propeller.warrantyvoid.us
Got an SD card connected? - PropDOS
Post Edited (Oldbitcollector) : 11/2/2008 5:57:20 PM GMT
Ken, you and Parallax need to be highly praised for the work you are doing with kids. They are indeed our future and should be treated as such.
@OBC,
I'm still a chord player myself. But I just don't have the time to put into that I used to. I used to play 3-4 hours every day. I never got the hang of playing lead though. I just don't have the ear for it.
When I went to Parallax the first time I was surprised to learn that Jon W. and John Barrowman both played guitar. It seems that our group of people have alot of guitar players. Must be something about being creative... I don't know but it's interesting.
Bean
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- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
"The welfare of the people in particular has always been the alibi of tyrants." ~ Camus
www.iElectronicDesigns.com
·
A year or so ago they seemed to stop stocking Elektor but then started again. Not sure if that was publisher or enthusiast pressure.
EPE is starting to go downhill a little, many of the projects being imported from Australia's Silicon Chip. The worse thing there is that they do not redraw circuits and use non-European conventions, 2.2k instead of 2K2 etc - That's not flamebait; a magazine used by students and teaching electronics should follow the standards that country has.
Easily my biggest challenge with this work has been to find participants. I can get them money, I can get them scholarships, I am more than willing to put in my own time - but I simply can't find women who are interested in this kind of activity.
Now, I know that aerospace isn't particularly "big" for women, so I'm going to try environmental measurement instead, and perhaps physiological sensing. But the clear lesson I've learned is that there is PLENTY of opportunity for women in science and technology - just not much demand. Again, I had no problem at all getting funding and scholarships for the women who did participate, and the Space Grant Consortium was eager to have women involved. I just couldn't find many. It's a shame, because they could write their own tickets. One of our May graduates in Biology was offered two different complete "free rides" from two major medical schools. There is plenty of opportunity out there.
(by the way, I'm a guy, despite the username: Sylvie is my cat)
The comments above about guitar playing are very interesting. I play guitar, and piano, and I sing. I learned all three by putting in many hours of effort. Similarly, je parle francais y tambien espanol. I've found that my colleagues in the natural sciences and in mathematics tend to also play instruments, sing, and speak foreign languages, while my colleagues in the social sciences don't tend to (by the way, I teach statistics, research methods, cognitive and physiological psychology, not that clinical/counseling stuff).
It seems to me that there are some people who expect to make an effort and to have to put in a lot of time to learn things - and who do put in that time and effort, and are rewarded with those abilities. There are also people who expect to pick up things easily in just a few weeks or months, and who, as a result, never really learn to do anything challenging.
Over the last year, I have probably gotten more satisfaction out of these do-it-yourself electronic devices than I have out of anything else in my life. I've certainly gotten far more satisfaction out of learning to play and sing a song on guitar or piano than I have ever gotten out of listening to anyone else play. Life would be outright dull without the "do-it-yourself" part.
One of the questions was: 'Which is the latest *book* you have read ?'
My answer was: 'An Imaginary Tale: The Story of i" by Paul Nahin.
The interviewer, for a moment,·tried to figure out what this book was about, and eventually she asked:
- 'Is it a technical, science·book or something '?
- Yes, it is
- 'Well I meant some *real* book, you know, some fiction book'
Amazingly·these days a technical or science book is not anymore a·*book* !.
They probably would have looked strangely at me too,
the last book I finished was Hackers: by Steven Levy
(History of the personal computer)
Unbelievable..
OBC
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New to the Propeller?
Getting started with a Propeller Protoboard?
Check out: Introduction to the Proboard & Propeller Cookbook 1.4
Updates to the Cookbook are now posted to: Propeller.warrantyvoid.us
Got an SD card connected? - PropDOS
There is a collective hacker's club in Brooklyn called Resistor, but I haven't checked it out yet. Seem like they mostly do Arduino projects. They did have a soldering contest that made the New York Times.
Anyway, I think instant gratification is only part of it: another part is difficulty to enter. As a hobby declines, it gets more exclusive by way of lack of visual attraction. For example, a hobby in it's prime has beginner classes everywhere, publications on the front of the newsrack, and so on. As the hobby fades, these visuals move further and further from the limelight, and soon it becomes a word of mouth enterprise: very difficult to find out about, even if you have a desire to join. Do you just ask people on the street: "Are you a roboticist?"
To give an example, here at the University there is going to be a SumoBot/Micromouse competition (no, not a Parallax bot). I wouldn't have any idea that it was going on, except that I took the time to get to know the local electronics technician.
As for music, I'll throw my experience out there: choir and handbells.
If you look at my avitar, I built this little guy to advertise the club and build interest. After several appearances, including greeting·the school superintendant during her beginning of school assembly, the interest has grown.·From a little over 100 students k-12 I got 5 that are interested and willing to work and learn. One of the girls in my club caught me the other night when we were doing some basic electricity experiments. She asked if this was realated to physics. Yes Physics is Phun!.
I haven't been able to visit these boards as much as I would like since I've found myself doing a lot of time preparing for our sessions. But the fun of seeing these students learning is worth it. I look at this project as a way of paying back what an engineering education did for me.
On the subject of music - I play bass clarinet and contra-bass clarinet in a local community band. I find it interesting that the other bass clarinet player (who also has a bass saxiphone) is a doctoral student in computer engineering.
On a side note - it would sure help if these boards had a spell checker. My typing is as bad as my ASL.
Post Edited (MSDTech) : 11/3/2008 1:22:57 AM GMT
Anyway, I was reading through my book on longitude, and what do you know, parallax made it in:
"The navigator also battled the problem of lunar parallax, since the [noparse][[/noparse]lunar navigation] tables were formulated for an observer at the center of the Earth, while a ship rides above the waves at about sea level, and the sailer on the quarterdeck might stand a good twenty feet higher than that. Such factors required rectifying by the appropriate calculations."(98)
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www.fd.com.my
www.mercedes.com.my
It's a new era of people that just want someone else to do it for them or give them a handout no need to exert yourself to learn anything that might make your brain have to actually think. Sort of like the way this election is going.
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Think Inside the box first and if that doesn't work..
Re-arrange what's inside the box then...
Think outside the BOX!
The reason I personally didn't want to join a local electronics club when I was in junior high or high school was because of how it was described: A HAM radio club. I was like, ewww analog and talking to creepy old guys. It was more along the lines of thinking: (digital and integrated circuits and eproms and programming was the future.) Take that for what you will, I was young and stupid, and didn't see the overlap. Plus when I did finally go to a meeting, it was so off-topic like the guitar sub-discussion here.
As for print media, I don't think that large text and glossy pictures of technical things fit well in a 4 page article. A single electronics project, to explain adequately would probably take up the whole magazine (source code, schematic, assembly process, ordering information, troubleshooting). What I am saying is that the internet is absolutely amazing in this regard, and that a bookstore, unless it's for cut and dry theory, almost isn't appropriate.
To ask where the community is on the internet, is to ignore the fact that we are talking on an internet message board... Where I feel such rapidly changing things are appropriate.
What angers me is how undocumented and proprietary every device has to be. There's only so much focus an individual can have. Yeah, it's fun at first, but it gets sadistic as it's pure hell to try and get any two different devices to communicate with each other. It truly is a major accomplishment to get, say, an LCD screen to even show a picture. Or poll a gaming controller. Or read a temperature sensor over a digital serial bus. There's so much effort getting something working, that it feels like more of an accomplishment that everything is set up to work, "if I could just now write" the application logic or whatever.
The whole arena is set up so that devices don't cooperate with each other, for business reasons or otherwise. That yes, there may be a common socket and voltage level and common bus that the data travels down, but how the devices is initialized and what commands it gets sent are such a secret in all but the most benign devices. It's like we're enemies at work and try to be friends outside.
Personal thing: I would write a book about Siemen's Simotion Industrial Motion Control system. But as the technology is so proprietary and I only have access to such a thing at work, work would catch wind of it and 1)Bring up the case that I'm giving away trade secrets and how-to information. and 2)Sue for everything I have, and win, because of the ridiculous contract I had to sign to even have hopes of a pay raise. (non-comp and intellectual property). 3)Make me pay for the electricity used after normal working hours.
So for paranoid me, there is an intentional effort to keep things isolated, secret and inaccessible. Not a really fun hobby, when seen that way.
I'm well aware of the wonderful books that authors put out about electronics, that lay it down step by step. Then, just when you think you have it, you hear wind of I2C, ADCs, Peltier Cells, or PICXXXXXXs.
Not a pro or con argument, just an observation.
When TV started up many people were building their own TVs, they just weren't easily available and very expensive.
When microprocessors hit the world the first possibility to own a computer within a reasonable budget was to build your own, hence the "homebrew" computer club and the like.
When I had the urge to make some holograms the only reasonably cheap way to go at the time was to build my own HeNe laser first.
So today what is the motivation for anyone to get into anything techy? We are all knee deep in electronics already, mobile phones, TVs, computers, games, navigators etc etc.
Parallax has one answer to this with robotics, if you want a robot you pretty much have to make it yourself, but I don't see that working on such a large scale as early radio did at the time.
@MSDTech and all : the message board does not spell check but my Firefox browser does. No idea about IE.
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For me, the past is not over yet.
A great browser addon for spell checking which works on most browsers is "IESPELL". I use it constantly. It will also spell check forms and anything that's in a browser input window. Right-click ==> Spell Check ==> interface with IESPELL ==> done.
Regards,
Bruce Bates
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When all else fails, try inserting a new battery.