<div>> <span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse">Look at the stuff that we built in our home shops. </span></div><div><font face="arial, sans-serif"><span style="border-collapse:collapse"><br>
</span></font></div><div><font face="arial, sans-serif"><span style="border-collapse:collapse">In the last two months I've built something in my </span></font></div><div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse"><br>
</span></div><div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse">> What the hell happened to us?</span></div><div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse"><br>
</span></div><div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse">Most of us are less than 100 years old, I think the people who wrote these magazines and those for whom they were written have moved on. There is no "us", here. This was never stuff for general consumption, you better believe "the general public" was mostly composed of condo dwelling morons 80 years ago, just like it is today. Although I'd prefer not to think of my neighbors as morons.</span></div>
<div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse"><br></span></div><div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse">> Where did we, as a nation of inventors, dreamers, builders and makers, go astray?</span></div>
<div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse"><br></span></div><div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse">You sound sad, you have reached maximum pessimismosity (peh-sih-miz-mosity). "Everything is amazing and nobody's happy." <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8r1CZTLk-Gk" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8r1CZTLk-Gk</a> </span></div>
<div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse"><br></span></div><div>I can see how you think that, but I disagree that anyone's gone astray. Perhaps the population of inventors relative to the general public shrunk on a percentage basis, but I would bet it has grown on a numbers basis. i.e., there are more inventive, creative makers alive today than at any point in history.</div>
<div><br></div><div>Many of us feel like we grew up surrounded by tools, by fixing, by making. But that's because *we* did, not because everyone did. A big reason I'm here is because I had access to interesting hardware and parents who didn't mind me screwing around with it. I know that wasn't true for even my next door neighbors and I'm certain it wasn't true for the whole world.</div>
<div><br></div><div>> <span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse">Why was this knowledge, these tips and tricks, ever allowed to be lost?</span></div>
<div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse"><br></span></div><div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse">You just shared a link to almost a hundred years of Popular Mechanics. What was lost again? The information exists and is accessible. We hold in our heads what we need to do our work today. "How to use a brace and bit" was useful 80 years ago, but it isn't necessary for a kid to know that today. If they need it, they can look it up, otherwise, let Google worry about it. Given that 90% of everything is crap (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sturgeon's_law" target="_blank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sturgeon's_law</a>), it would be safe assume that even the old knowledge, unless it has proven itself by remaining current, is better left in the dustbin of history.</span></div>
<div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse"><br></span></div><div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse">> Today our schools teach the kids garbage</span></div>
<div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse"><br></span></div><div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse">You've got no argument from me there. My kids will never step through the door of a public (or private) school as long as I have the means to provide for their needs. I would add that I don't believe the schools of mass education were ever a wonderful thing for modern society. At best, they taught shop skills 80 years ago so that the factories would have a steady stream of workers. They're in the same business today they were then, churn out employees.</span></div>
<div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse"><br></span></div><div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse">> your average condo dwelling urban moron has no freaking what they are looking at when they go to a hardware store...I see it every time I'm at Ace or Home Depot.</span></div>
<div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse"><br>It's difficult to compare Home Depot to anything that existed in the 1930's. If you took a random member of the general public and threw them into a tool and die supply shop then, I guarantee you're likely to end up with confused looks and mortal wounds.</span></div>
<div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse"><br></span></div><div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse">- - - - -</span></div>
<div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse"><br></span></div><div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse">I'm happy to defend the contemporary age and say we've got more opportunity to do interesting work with our hands and our minds than at any time in history. More importantly, I didn't get into the hackerspace thing because everyone was already doing this stuff, I did it because I want to see everyone doing this stuff. Ignorance where it is forced (North Korea, public schools, etc.) is ugly, but where it is accidental, it's neutral. We've got to show them why this knowledge is valuable, why microcontrollers are interesting. Whining people into action doesn't work. It's impossible to get people inspired for action by focusing on a negative ("Look how lousy we are!" or "Here's a list of things we shouldn't do...").<br>
</span></div><div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse"><br></span></div><div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse">I hope I didn't use so much sarcasm it broke my arguments. I've been trying to track down why I disagree with this general sentiment for a bit (another example, which I think was linked on this list before: <a href="http://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/shop-class-as-soulcraft">http://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/shop-class-as-soulcraft</a>) and am trying to peel away some of the layers here. I know from experience that if I spend too much time on the interwebs (especially Reddit, Digg, etc.), I come away with pessimism and cynicism, but those are feelings that only tear down. Let's build something awesome out of what we have available to us. Spending time tearing it all down is boring. The new things we come up with will either replace the existing or not, the same as it's always been, forever and ever, amen.</span></div>
<div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse"><br></span></div><div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse"><br>
</span></div><div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse">- Adam </span></div><div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse"><a href="http://baltimorenode.org" target="_blank">http://baltimorenode.org</a></span></div>
<div><br></div><div> </div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div><font face="arial, sans-serif"><br></font></div><div><span style="font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;border-collapse:collapse"><br>
</span></div><div class="gmail_quote">On Wed, Mar 3, 2010 at 11:55 AM, Hank The Curmudgeon <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:hkrishman@gmail.com" target="_blank">hkrishman@gmail.com</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
Go and find the "Popular Mechanics" issues from around 1930 (Google<br>
"page" 31 at the bottom of the main search page, linked below) and<br>
move forward. Grab a random issue and check the index. I am<br>
specifically referring to the project pages. Though the ads and<br>
feature articles are fun toothey are not the subject of my mini rant.<br>
Look at the stuff that we built in our home shops. What the hell<br>
happened to us? Where did we, as a nation of inventors, dreamers,<br>
builders and makers, go astray??? Why was this knowledge, these tips<br>
and tricks, ever allowed to be lost? Today our schools teach the kids<br>
garbage and your average condo dwelling urban moron has no freaking<br>
what they are looking at when they go to a hardware store...I see it<br>
every time I'm at Ace or Home Depot. Sad...<br>
<br>
<a href="http://books.google.com/books/serial/ISSN:00324558?rview=1&lr=&output=html&sa=N&start=900" target="_blank">http://books.google.com/books/serial/ISSN:00324558?rview=1&lr=&output=html&sa=N&start=900</a><br>
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