[sdiy] Death of DIY?

[Grant Richter]

> For my own sake, I actually enjoy teching people things. My best
> reward is when people are happy for having learnt something and seeing
> that they have extended thier abilities to do things. This gives me a
> kind of warm and fuzzy feeling.

There is a great kindness and generosity of spirit among DIYers. The old
Hams that took me under wing, were very kind and patient with a stupid kid.
That in itself was enough to make me want to be like them.

I can't praise radio amateurs enough. It used to be the only local people
with any knowledge of electronics were the Hams. It's not like an 11 year
old could walk into an engineering company and ask for help with a
transistor circuit...

Actually I DID do that, and the secretary called an engineer (George
Hoffman, UNICO Inc.) who let me in the engineering lab and helped me get my
flip-flop to, well, flip-flop. Can you imagine anyone doing that anymore?
The other engineers and the engineering manager came over to find out what a
kid was doing in the shop, but no one suggested for a second that they NOT
help me.

Lucky for me, I walked into a firm with engineers like Magnus.

My hat is off to all the fine engineers, technicians, hams and other cool
people who have made electronics a fantastic experience.