[sdiy] Real cause of DIY death

[nN AAt e e]

> Personally, synth-DIY for me was fuel by *amazement*. What does a 15yr old
boy
> find 'amazing' today? Getting to Level 33 on Zelda? Maybe big-ass plasma
TVs are
> pretty cool, bet they are a bitch to DIY :)

    Speaking as a real live 19 year old boy, i'll kind of agree with part of
the above... but things that at least I find amazing are:

- videogames: not getting to the next level, but abandoning levels all
together; get finished with the goals early and then the rest of the game is
an ultimate 'sandbox' mode ... re: http://spore.ea.com/ ... games with
massive environments that let you do anything you want.

- synths: taking something like the nord modular and adding midi modules and
other features like that... like a nord modular g2, reaktor, and max/msp in
a box. like the games above, just incredible possibility.

- misc consumer tech: not plasma TVs, because they aren't too different from
LCDs, so it's not like kids haven't seen something like that before. it's
when you see a brief clip in a technology show that mentions one of the
major LCD/plasma companies working on full wall, paper thin, TVs... just
gives that kind of "holy shit, that's awesome" feeling. in a similar vein to
that, tactile controllers with flexability - there's the lemur, and that new
sony button one, and a prototype keyboard with LCDs in the keys to show
icons depending on what app you use.

- computers: people always get excited about faster processors or new
systems, but the biggest changes are when small things are updated... USB
2.0 was a huge improvement, and faster busses for assorted stuff make such a
big difference. i do a lot of DAW work [VSTs + DX plugs, but no VSTi or
DXi], and lots of graphic design, and my computer is probably on par with a
near top of the line system from early 2000. do i want a new computer? no,
and my computer right now is about as fast as the 1.5ghz + 256 mb ram
computer my family uses - because i know what i'm doing. i can run 25+
channels of audio, or 12 with eq and multiband compressors on most of the
channels and i don't get dropouts. look around online and you'll find sites
saying that to do wordprocessing and web browsing, you should have a 2ghz
processor and at least 512mb of ram - other than more hearty flash websites,
there's no reason why you would need a system like that when you could do
the same exact thing three years ago with less than half of those specs.
it's the reason why people don't use a $150 Texas Instruments graphing
calculator to add up receipts - it's overkill. i find it strange that a lot
of more computer/DIY/programming kids i know always want to buy faster
computers even if they don't play games or do 3d work... PCs are one of the
biggest DIY opportunities left for the average consumer [other than cars and
houses], so why treat it like a throwaway type thing if there's so much to
tweak?

- don't forget that copyright laws, freespeech, and the record industry is
changing a lot very soon!

    every time i have played a show with gameboy, everyone always wants to
know how the hell i did that, and i explain about how you can get
programmable gameboy carts, and that people write new programs for it, and
that it's not that hard, they get the idea like 'oh, this is easy, i can do
it too' - like circuit bending, when someone realizes how easy it is, they
understand there's a whole new world out there they haven't explored.

new opportunity, and awe inspiring changes are what's important. like that
"holy shit, that's awesome" feeling, knowing that something you have never
even thought about will be done within your lifetime, is just really good.
anything that's different or weird to people [piercings i've had :P ] they
always want to know more.

- nathan... wow i wrote a lot of crap, and i think i got off track
somewhere, but you get the idea :\