Magazine subscription

[T.T.]

Today I realised that I haven't had a Silicon Chip for a while. It seems
that my subscription ran out in April 2010 and nobody told me. I guess that
if I didn't notice it had stopped coming, I won't miss it if I don't
re-subscribe. I have subscribed to at least one of the magazines since the
1950s, and before then I would buy Radio and Hobbies from the newsagent.
I won't miss Silicon Chip, but I do miss being as interested and aware as I
used to be.

 

[fritz]

"T.T." <tonyt92@bigpond.com> wrote in message newsjMWo.7471$gM3.6405@viwinnwfe01.internal.bigpond.com...

Today I realised that I haven't had a Silicon Chip for a while. It seems that my subscription ran out in April 2010 and nobody
told me. I guess that if I didn't notice it had stopped coming, I won't miss it if I don't re-subscribe. I have subscribed to at
least one of the magazines since the 1950s, and before then I would buy Radio and Hobbies from the newsagent.
I won't miss Silicon Chip, but I do miss being as interested and aware as I used to be.

It took 8 months to realise SC wasn't in the letterbox ?
Maybe you need another interest - how about building a Stirling engine model?
https://sites.google.com/site/stirlingbuilder/paint-can-stirling-engine

Electronics is not what it used to be as a hobby, though. In the past the
electronics mags published projects that were usually either not available elsewhere
or were much cheaper to build yourself. These days there are so many
electronic gadgets available so cheaply that I fear the electronic hobbyist is a dying
breed. My first project was a Playmaster 136 amp, all of 13W per channel, bought
in kit form from DSE when there was only one branch - at Gore Hill.
There are still some interesting (but expensive) project kits around, compare the
following project to the old Playmaster 136:
http://www.elektor.com/products/kits-modules/kits/090563-71-modulo-d.1255175.lynkx

The really staggering advances have been in microprocessors - my first uP project was the
'baby 2650' from EA, it had 1kB of ROM containing the monitor program, a massive
256 bytes of RAM and it ran at the breakneck speed of 1MHz.

 

[kreed]

On Jan 11, 9:08 am, "T.T." <tony...@bigpond.com> wrote:

Today I realised that I haven't had a Silicon Chip for a while. It seems
that my subscription ran out in April 2010 and nobody told me. I guess that
if I didn't notice it had stopped coming, I won't miss it if I don't
re-subscribe. I have subscribed to at least one of the magazines since the
1950s, and before then I would buy Radio and Hobbies from the newsagent.
I won't miss Silicon Chip, but I do miss being as interested and aware as I
used to be.

I still get it, and I don't mind reading it every month, but I do
think long and hard before resubscribing,
though have kept going mostly from force of habit and that there isn't
anything else in Aus any more.

EA was great in its heyday, but that's gone, and won't return.

Too many things now are too cheap to buy, rather than build would be
the main reason, though SC does produce some unique
projects that I haven't seen elsewhere commercially available, that I
find interesting, even though most I don't build.

A

Also would be good for students and people learning.

 

[Bruce Varley]

"fritz" <yaputya@microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:igg7fc$s5r$00$1@news.t-online.com...

"T.T." <tonyt92@bigpond.com> wrote in message
newsjMWo.7471$gM3.6405@viwinnwfe01.internal.bigpond.com...
Today I realised that I haven't had a Silicon Chip for a while. It seems
that my subscription ran out in April 2010 and nobody told me. I guess
that if I didn't notice it had stopped coming, I won't miss it if I don't
re-subscribe. I have subscribed to at least one of the magazines since
the 1950s, and before then I would buy Radio and Hobbies from the
newsagent.
I won't miss Silicon Chip, but I do miss being as interested and aware as
I used to be.

It took 8 months to realise SC wasn't in the letterbox ?
Maybe you need another interest - how about building a Stirling engine
model?
https://sites.google.com/site/stirlingbuilder/paint-can-stirling-engine

Electronics is not what it used to be as a hobby, though. In the past the
electronics mags published projects that were usually either not available
elsewhere
or were much cheaper to build yourself. These days there are so many
electronic gadgets available so cheaply that I fear the electronic
hobbyist is a dying
breed. My first project was a Playmaster 136 amp, all of 13W per channel,
bought
in kit form from DSE when there was only one branch - at Gore Hill.
There are still some interesting (but expensive) project kits around,
compare the
following project to the old Playmaster 136:
http://www.elektor.com/products/kits-modules/kits/090563-71-modulo-d.1255175.lynkx

The really staggering advances have been in microprocessors - my first uP
project was the
'baby 2650' from EA, it had 1kB of ROM containing the monitor program, a
massive
256 bytes of RAM and it ran at the breakneck speed of 1MHz.

The current situation is actually a bonanza for anyone with imagination,

who's prepared to dream up their own projects and do a bit of home design.
Any level of prototyping kit is available, all the way from discretes up to
advanced micro platforms, generally at hobby type prices. Current datasheets
available day and night with a couple of mouse clicks. And there are
circuits on the web for everything. I haven't bought an electronics mag
since EA died, and haven't skipped a beat.

 

[David L. Jones]

On Jan 11, 9:53 am, "fritz" <yapu...@microsoft.com> wrote:

"T.T." <tony...@bigpond.com> wrote in messagenewsjMWo.7471$gM3.6405@viwinnwfe01.internal.bigpond.com...
Today I realised that I haven't had a Silicon Chip for a while. It seems that my subscription ran out in April 2010 and nobody
told me. I guess that if I didn't notice it had stopped coming, I won't miss it if I don't re-subscribe. I have subscribed to at
least one of the magazines since the 1950s, and before then I would buy Radio and Hobbies from the newsagent.
I won't miss Silicon Chip, but I do miss being as interested and aware as I used to be.

It took 8 months to realise SC wasn't in the letterbox ?
Maybe you need another interest - how about building a Stirling engine model?https://sites.google.com/site/stirlingbuilder/paint-can-stirling-engine

Electronics is not what it used to be as a hobby, though. In the past the
electronics mags published projects that were usually either not available elsewhere
or were much cheaper to build yourself. These days there are so many
electronic gadgets available so cheaply that I fear the electronic hobbyist is a dying
breed.

It's not, in fact it's had a massive resurgence through the hacker/
modder/maker/hackerspace movements.
Even if it's not so much traditional "hardcore" hobby electronics, you
still have all these young kids buying multimeters and soldering irons
and doing some electronics. Even if it is just using an Arduino board
to flash their LED's etc.
Open source hardware is getting big too, and startup kit businesses
like Sparkfun, DIY Drones and Adafruit et.al can be turning over $10M+
selling kits.

Dave.

 

[terryc]

David L. Jones wrote:

It's not, in fact it's had a massive resurgence through the hacker/
modder/maker/hackerspace movements.

They are just not very good at keeping web pages current.

Even if it's not so much traditional "hardcore" hobby electronics, you
still have all these young kids buying multimeters and soldering irons
and doing some electronics. Even if it is just using an Arduino board
to flash their LED's etc.

Young kids? The only ones I know of are oldish and into art/fart projects.

 

[Bruce Varley]

"terryc" <newsninespam-spam@woa.com.au> wrote in message
news:ighhs5$us9$1@news.eternal-september.org...

David L. Jones wrote:

It's not, in fact it's had a massive resurgence through the hacker/
modder/maker/hackerspace movements.

They are just not very good at keeping web pages current.

Even if it's not so much traditional "hardcore" hobby electronics, you
still have all these young kids buying multimeters and soldering irons
and doing some electronics. Even if it is just using an Arduino board
to flash their LED's etc.

Young kids? The only ones I know of are oldish and into art/fart projects.

Que? The oldie projects I'm aware of amongst my colleagues don't fit the
artie fartie model at all. Mean guitar amps, adjuncts for the new sports car
(midlife crisis model) plus lots of hugely educational and clever stuff,
lots of it based on fairly serious electronics, that I'm not going to
mention because it could be worth something.

Can't recall one potters wheel varispeed, kiln furnace control, easel angle
controller or conductors baton light. Or anything faintly related.

 

[terryc]

Bruce Varley wrote:

adjuncts for the new sports car (midlife crisis model)
plus lots ........... that I'm not going to
mention because it could be worth something.

Hardly hackerspace, especially the commercial development.
Beautiful post supporting fritz and my points.

 

[keithr]

On 11/01/2011 7:40 PM, David L. Jones wrote:

On Jan 11, 9:53 am, "fritz"<yapu...@microsoft.com> wrote:
"T.T."<tony...@bigpond.com> wrote in messagenewsjMWo.7471$gM3.6405@viwinnwfe01.internal.bigpond.com...
Today I realised that I haven't had a Silicon Chip for a while. It seems that my subscription ran out in April 2010 and nobody
told me. I guess that if I didn't notice it had stopped coming, I won't miss it if I don't re-subscribe. I have subscribed to at
least one of the magazines since the 1950s, and before then I would buy Radio and Hobbies from the newsagent.
I won't miss Silicon Chip, but I do miss being as interested and aware as I used to be.

It took 8 months to realise SC wasn't in the letterbox ?
Maybe you need another interest - how about building a Stirling engine model?https://sites.google.com/site/stirlingbuilder/paint-can-stirling-engine

Electronics is not what it used to be as a hobby, though. In the past the
electronics mags published projects that were usually either not available elsewhere
or were much cheaper to build yourself. These days there are so many
electronic gadgets available so cheaply that I fear the electronic hobbyist is a dying
breed.

It's not, in fact it's had a massive resurgence through the hacker/
modder/maker/hackerspace movements.
Even if it's not so much traditional "hardcore" hobby electronics, you
still have all these young kids buying multimeters and soldering irons
and doing some electronics. Even if it is just using an Arduino board
to flash their LED's etc.
Open source hardware is getting big too, and startup kit businesses
like Sparkfun, DIY Drones and Adafruit et.al can be turning over $10M+
selling kits.

Dave.

My argument with SC is that, in an age when so many projects are
microprocessor based, they so rarely release the source code. One of the
great things in the "Old days" was that, if you aspired to do more than
just solder a bunch of parts together, you could modify the project to
your hearts content. That should be even easier these days by playing
with the software, but only if you have the project source code to start
with.

 

[fritz]

"Bruce Varley" <bv@NoSpam.com> wrote in message news:37ednV1jhqHknrHQnZ2dnUVZ8iydnZ2d@westnet.com.au...

"fritz" <yaputya@microsoft.com> wrote in message news:igg7fc$s5r$00$1@news.t-online.com...

"T.T." <tonyt92@bigpond.com> wrote in message newsjMWo.7471$gM3.6405@viwinnwfe01.internal.bigpond.com...
Today I realised that I haven't had a Silicon Chip for a while. It seems that my subscription ran out in April 2010 and nobody
told me. I guess that if I didn't notice it had stopped coming, I won't miss it if I don't re-subscribe. I have subscribed to at
least one of the magazines since the 1950s, and before then I would buy Radio and Hobbies from the newsagent.
I won't miss Silicon Chip, but I do miss being as interested and aware as I used to be.

It took 8 months to realise SC wasn't in the letterbox ?
Maybe you need another interest - how about building a Stirling engine model?
https://sites.google.com/site/stirlingbuilder/paint-can-stirling-engine

Electronics is not what it used to be as a hobby, though. In the past the
electronics mags published projects that were usually either not available elsewhere
or were much cheaper to build yourself. These days there are so many
electronic gadgets available so cheaply that I fear the electronic hobbyist is a dying
breed. My first project was a Playmaster 136 amp, all of 13W per channel, bought
in kit form from DSE when there was only one branch - at Gore Hill.
There are still some interesting (but expensive) project kits around, compare the
following project to the old Playmaster 136:
http://www.elektor.com/products/kits-modules/kits/090563-71-modulo-d.1255175.lynkx

The really staggering advances have been in microprocessors - my first uP project was the
'baby 2650' from EA, it had 1kB of ROM containing the monitor program, a massive
256 bytes of RAM and it ran at the breakneck speed of 1MHz.

The current situation is actually a bonanza for anyone with imagination, who's prepared to dream up their own projects and do a
bit of home design.

True, but dreaming up a new project is becoming harder as the number of
off the shelf electronic gadgets increases daily. The last project I did was
a sun tracker using red LEDs as sensors - it was more mechanical than
electronic.

Any level of prototyping kit is available, all the way from discretes up to advanced micro platforms, generally at hobby type
prices. Current datasheets available day and night with a couple of mouse clicks. And there are circuits on the web for
everything. I haven't bought an electronics mag since EA died, and haven't skipped a beat.

The online PDF datasheets certainly are great, although I've still got a
1976 National Linear databook which still covers a surprising number of chips today.
You haven't bought Silicon Chip ? If nobody buys the mag, a source of some of
the stuff on the 'net will dry up. I noticed one of my SC Circuit Notebook contributions
appeared on many different websites.

 

[fritz]

"David L. Jones" <altzone@gmail.com> wrote in message news:27d9ff18-f7f6-4fc1-ae46-95bcdf3be613@c39g2000yqi.googlegroups.com...
On Jan 11, 9:53 am, "fritz" <yapu...@microsoft.com> wrote:

"T.T." <tony...@bigpond.com> wrote in messagenewsjMWo.7471$gM3.6405@viwinnwfe01.internal.bigpond.com...
Today I realised that I haven't had a Silicon Chip for a while. It seems that my subscription ran out in April 2010 and nobody
told me. I guess that if I didn't notice it had stopped coming, I won't miss it if I don't re-subscribe. I have subscribed to at
least one of the magazines since the 1950s, and before then I would buy Radio and Hobbies from the newsagent.
I won't miss Silicon Chip, but I do miss being as interested and aware as I used to be.

It took 8 months to realise SC wasn't in the letterbox ?
Maybe you need another interest - how about building a Stirling engine
model?https://sites.google.com/site/stirlingbuilder/paint-can-stirling-engine

Electronics is not what it used to be as a hobby, though. In the past the
electronics mags published projects that were usually either not available elsewhere
or were much cheaper to build yourself. These days there are so many
electronic gadgets available so cheaply that I fear the electronic hobbyist is a dying
breed.

-It's not, in fact it's had a massive resurgence through the hacker/
-modder/maker/hackerspace movements.
-Even if it's not so much traditional "hardcore" hobby electronics, you
-still have all these young kids buying multimeters and soldering irons
-and doing some electronics. Even if it is just using an Arduino board
-to flash their LED's etc.
-Open source hardware is getting big too, and startup kit businesses
-like Sparkfun, DIY Drones and Adafruit et.al can be turning over $10M+
-selling kits.

-Dave.

Hackers are far more into the software side - meaning they are more programmers
than electronic hobbyists. I noticed you mentioned the 'hackability' of the LCR meter
in your #137 blog...
http://www.eevblog.com/2011/01/02/eevblog-137-bk-precision-879b-handheld-lcr-meter-review/
Now that is fine to point out, but why would you want to mess around with the software
in an LCR meter ? Maybe a specialist might have some need, but your average hobbyist
will not want to risk stuffing up the accuracy. I think you mentioned that it didn't come with
a calibration certificate - what's the use if you hack it ?

I still think that people who in the past would build electonic projects from magazine
articles are more likely these days to spend their money on a pre-built gadget.
(I would love to get hold of an 800mW laser module, if I could get it past customs!)

Also, the trend to surface-mount and micro-sized components will inevitably lead
to fewer people making their own pcbs and instead using stuff like the Arduino board
for projects. Not that I think that is a bad thing, it saves a lot of time but it seems to
be at a cost - pcb design skills.

 

[fritz]

"keithr" <keithr@nowhere.com.au> wrote in message news:4d2cd252$1@dnews.tpgi.com.au...

On 11/01/2011 7:40 PM, David L. Jones wrote:
On Jan 11, 9:53 am, "fritz"<yapu...@microsoft.com> wrote:
"T.T."<tony...@bigpond.com> wrote in messagenewsjMWo.7471$gM3.6405@viwinnwfe01.internal.bigpond.com...
Today I realised that I haven't had a Silicon Chip for a while. It seems that my subscription ran out in April 2010 and nobody
told me. I guess that if I didn't notice it had stopped coming, I won't miss it if I don't re-subscribe. I have subscribed to
at
least one of the magazines since the 1950s, and before then I would buy Radio and Hobbies from the newsagent.
I won't miss Silicon Chip, but I do miss being as interested and aware as I used to be.

It took 8 months to realise SC wasn't in the letterbox ?
Maybe you need another interest - how about building a Stirling engine
model?https://sites.google.com/site/stirlingbuilder/paint-can-stirling-engine

Electronics is not what it used to be as a hobby, though. In the past the
electronics mags published projects that were usually either not available elsewhere
or were much cheaper to build yourself. These days there are so many
electronic gadgets available so cheaply that I fear the electronic hobbyist is a dying
breed.

It's not, in fact it's had a massive resurgence through the hacker/
modder/maker/hackerspace movements.
Even if it's not so much traditional "hardcore" hobby electronics, you
still have all these young kids buying multimeters and soldering irons
and doing some electronics. Even if it is just using an Arduino board
to flash their LED's etc.
Open source hardware is getting big too, and startup kit businesses
like Sparkfun, DIY Drones and Adafruit et.al can be turning over $10M+
selling kits.

Dave.

My argument with SC is that, in an age when so many projects are microprocessor based, they so rarely release the source code. One
of the great things in the "Old days" was that, if you aspired to do more than just solder a bunch of parts together, you could
modify the project to your hearts content. That should be even easier these days by playing with the software, but only if you
have the project source code to start with.

Not sure about this, but most of the SC uP projects in the last decade
have been from a Mr. John Clark. AFAIK he has made the assembler listing
available for most of his projects. When an article is contributed, that is
it comes from outside of the SC staff, the software author does not always
make the assember listing available, probably because SC doesn't want to
pay extra.

 

[fritz]

"David L. Jones" <altzone@gmail.com> wrote in message news:224f0307-e8bf-4bcf-9dd1-90274179986c@f30g2000yqa.googlegroups.com...
On Jan 11, 11:19 pm, terryc <newsninespam-s...@woa.com.au> wrote:

David L. Jones wrote:
It's not, in fact it's had a massive resurgence through the hacker/
modder/maker/hackerspace movements.

They are just not very good at keeping web pages current.

Even if it's not so much traditional "hardcore" hobby electronics, you
still have all these young kids buying multimeters and soldering irons
and doing some electronics. Even if it is just using an Arduino board
to flash their LED's etc.

Young kids? The only ones I know of are oldish and into art/fart projects.

-I have literally thousands of young kids who watch my EEVblog every
-week.
-The video, photos, and stories of the MakerFair that gets 100,000+
-people seem to be mostly kids.
-Not too dissimilar stories for Hackerspaces either.
-The soldering tutorial classes at these kinds of places seem to be
-packed out with young kid every time.
-And the number of youngsters on Youtube channels and hacker blogs I
-see never seems to end.

-The way see it, there is an electronics oriented revival happening,
-and it ain't based around old farts.

-Dave.

Please teach the yanks how to pronounce 'solder'.
They all seem to have been dropped at birth or some other
disaster has affected their speech ability -
- they all seem to say 'soder' . as if the 'l'
wasn't there at all .

 

[David L. Jones]

On Jan 12, 9:56 am, "fritz" <yapu...@microsoft.com> wrote:

"keithr" <kei...@nowhere.com.au> wrote in messagenews:4d2cd252$1@dnews.tpgi.com.au...
On 11/01/2011 7:40 PM, David L. Jones wrote:
On Jan 11, 9:53 am, "fritz"<yapu...@microsoft.com>  wrote:
"T.T."<tony...@bigpond.com>  wrote in messagenewsjMWo.7471$gM3.6405@viwinnwfe01.internal.bigpond.com...
Today I realised that I haven't had a Silicon Chip for a while. It seems that my subscription ran out in April 2010 and nobody
told me. I guess that if I didn't notice it had stopped coming, I won't miss it if I don't re-subscribe. I have subscribed to
at
least one of the magazines since the 1950s, and before then I would buy Radio and Hobbies from the newsagent.
I won't miss Silicon Chip, but I do miss being as interested and aware as I used to be.

It took 8 months to realise SC wasn't in the letterbox ?
Maybe you need another interest - how about building a Stirling engine
model?https://sites.google.com/site/stirlingbuilder/paint-can-stirling-engine

Electronics is not what it used to be as a hobby, though. In the past the
electronics mags published projects that were usually either not available elsewhere
or were much cheaper to build yourself. These days there are so many
electronic gadgets available so cheaply that I fear the electronic hobbyist is a dying
breed.

It's not, in fact it's had a massive resurgence through the hacker/
modder/maker/hackerspace movements.
Even if it's not so much traditional "hardcore" hobby electronics, you
still have all these young kids buying multimeters and soldering irons
and doing some electronics. Even if it is just using an Arduino board
to flash their LED's etc.
Open source hardware is getting big too, and startup kit businesses
like Sparkfun, DIY Drones and Adafruit et.al can be turning over $10M+
selling kits.

Dave.

My argument with SC is that, in an age when so many projects are microprocessor based, they so rarely release the source code. One
of the great things in the "Old days" was that, if you aspired to do more than just solder a bunch of parts together, you could
modify the project to your hearts content. That should be even easier these days by playing with the software, but only if you
have the project source code to start with.

Not sure about this, but most of the SC uP projects in the last decade
have been from a Mr. John Clark. AFAIK he has made the assembler listing
available for most of his projects. When an article is contributed, that is
it comes from outside of the SC staff, the software author does not always
make the assember listing available, probably because SC doesn't want to
pay extra.

Authors shouldn't expect to get extra for source code, and SC don't
offer nor pay extra for it.
You get a flat rate of $100/page for an article, if you want to keep
the code to yourself then that's the authors choice, although it may
sometimes impact upon the decision by SC to publish or not.
Mauro Grassi and Nicholas Vinnen have been churning out some nice
micro based projects, and Jim Rowe has been doing some too.

Dave.

 

[David L. Jones]

On Jan 12, 9:40 am, "fritz" <yapu...@microsoft.com> wrote:

"David L. Jones" <altz...@gmail.com> wrote in messagenews:27d9ff18-f7f6-4fc1-ae46-95bcdf3be613@c39g2000yqi.googlegroups.com...
On Jan 11, 9:53 am, "fritz" <yapu...@microsoft.com> wrote:

"T.T." <tony...@bigpond.com> wrote in messagenewsjMWo.7471$gM3.6405@viwinnwfe01.internal.bigpond.com...
Today I realised that I haven't had a Silicon Chip for a while. It seems that my subscription ran out in April 2010 and nobody
told me. I guess that if I didn't notice it had stopped coming, I won't miss it if I don't re-subscribe. I have subscribed to at
least one of the magazines since the 1950s, and before then I would buy Radio and Hobbies from the newsagent.
I won't miss Silicon Chip, but I do miss being as interested and aware as I used to be.

It took 8 months to realise SC wasn't in the letterbox ?
Maybe you need another interest - how about building a Stirling engine
model?https://sites.google.com/site/stirlingbuilder/paint-can-stirling-engine

Electronics is not what it used to be as a hobby, though. In the past the
electronics mags published projects that were usually either not available elsewhere
or were much cheaper to build yourself. These days there are so many
electronic gadgets available so cheaply that I fear the electronic hobbyist is a dying
breed.

-It's not, in fact it's had a massive resurgence through the hacker/
-modder/maker/hackerspace movements.
-Even if it's not so much traditional "hardcore" hobby electronics, you
-still have all these young kids buying multimeters and soldering irons
-and doing some electronics. Even if it is just using an Arduino board
-to flash their LED's etc.
-Open source hardware is getting big too, and startup kit businesses
-like Sparkfun, DIY Drones and Adafruit et.al can be turning over $10M+
-selling kits.

-Dave.

Hackers are far more into the software side - meaning they are more programmers
than electronic hobbyists.

I wouldn't disagree with that in general, but I think you'd be
surprised in the things these hacker and makers are building. Robots,
UAV's etc are incredibly popular.
Check out any Hacker Space and see that they are mostly building
stuff, not just hacking iPhone software.
At least they are playing around with electronics, and that's gotta be
a good thing in my view.

There will always be (a lot) more software hackers than hardware
hackers, but hardware hacking is definitely making a big comeback.

I noticed you mentioned the 'hackability' of the LCR meter
in your #137 blog...http://www.eevblog.com/2011/01/02/eevblog-137-bk-precision-879b-handh...
Now that is fine to point out, but why would you want to mess around with the software
in an LCR meter ?

Maybe a specialist might have some need, but your average hobbyist
will not want to risk stuffing up the accuracy. I think you mentioned that it didn't come with
a calibration certificate - what's the use if you hack it ?

Most wouldn't want to hack, but I thought I'd point it out in case
someone wanted to for some reason that I can't think of.
It's always nice when you have easy access to JTAG and programming
headers inside products.
Some may want to just do it for fun or learning perhaps?
Who knows, who cares, having the headers is a good thing. Someone
might surprise you at what's possible...

I still think that people who in the past would build electonic projects from magazine
articles are more likely these days to spend their money on a pre-built gadget.
(I would love to get hold of an 800mW laser module, if I could get it past customs!)

Sure, that trend has been going for as long as I've been been alive,
nothing new there.

Also, the trend to surface-mount and micro-sized components will inevitably lead
to fewer people making their own pcbs and instead using stuff like the Arduino board
for projects. Not that I think that is a bad thing, it saves a lot of time but it seems to
be at a cost - pcb design skills.

It costs in many ways, not just PCB skills.
Once again though, nothing new there really, that kind of thing has
been going on for decades.

Dave.

 

[David L. Jones]

On Jan 11, 11:19 pm, terryc <newsninespam-s...@woa.com.au> wrote:

David L. Jones wrote:
It's not, in fact it's had a massive resurgence through the hacker/
modder/maker/hackerspace movements.

They are just not very good at keeping web pages current.

Even if it's not so much traditional "hardcore" hobby electronics, you
still have all these young kids buying multimeters and soldering irons
and doing some electronics. Even if it is just using an Arduino board
to flash their LED's etc.

Young kids? The only ones I know of are oldish and into art/fart projects..

I have literally thousands of young kids who watch my EEVblog every
week.
The video, photos, and stories of the MakerFair that gets 100,000+
people seem to be mostly kids.
Not too dissimilar stories for Hackerspaces either.
The soldering tutorial classes at these kinds of places seem to be
packed out with young kid every time.
And the number of youngsters on Youtube channels and hacker blogs I
see never seems to end.

The way see it, there is an electronics oriented revival happening,
and it ain't based around old farts.

Dave.

 

[terryc]

David L. Jones wrote:

I have literally thousands of young kids who watch my EEVblog every
week.
The video, photos, and stories of the MakerFair that gets 100,000+
people seem to be mostly kids.

Watching =/= doing. Do you have any idea of how many are doing or even
trying?

Not too dissimilar stories for Hackerspaces either.

Which hackerspaces?
Certainly not the ones I know about.

 

[David L. Jones]

On Jan 12, 11:55 am, "fritz" <yapu...@microsoft.com> wrote:

Please teach the yanks how to pronounce 'solder'.
They all seem to have been dropped at birth or some other
disaster has affected their speech ability -
-  they all seem to say 'soder' . as if the 'l'
wasn't there at all .

That is a running joke on my radio show The AmpHour that I co-host
with a Yank.

Dave.

 

[David L. Jones]

On Jan 12, 12:30 pm, terryc <newsninespam-s...@woa.com.au> wrote:

David L. Jones wrote:
I have literally thousands of young kids who watch my EEVblog every
week.
The video, photos, and stories of the MakerFair that gets 100,000+
people seem to be mostly kids.

Watching =/= doing. Do you have any idea of how many are doing or even
trying?

Almost every one of them that contact me or chat on my forum. Many
hundreds at a minimum, so it would be very representative of viewers
overall I would think.
Many are software people who want to get into hardware.
So I feel very safe in saying that the vast majority of everyone (and
not just kids) that watch my show are into hardware in some way.
Sorry if that contradicts any pessimistic views!

Which hackerspaces?
Certainly not the ones I know about.

The whole concept of hacker spaces is somewhere you go to primarily
share hardware resources, tools, and talent. If you just want to hack
software, there are countless online forums with 10's of thousands of
members.
I'd be very surprised if there are many hackerspace members who don't
at least have an interest in building something.

Dave.

 

[keithr]

On 12/01/2011 9:40 AM, fritz wrote:

I still think that people who in the past would build electonic projects from magazine
articles are more likely these days to spend their money on a pre-built gadget.
(I would love to get hold of an 800mW laser module, if I could get it past customs!)

AFAIK lasers as such are not banned, only laser pointers. From the
Customs web site:-

Laser pointers (restricted import)

Description:
Hand-held devices commonly known as laser pointers with an accessible
emission level of greater than 1mW.