[sdiy] History of SDIY?

Tue May 29 21:33:09 CEST 2018

I think for it to work as a book , the author or editor just needs to know what THEY mean by sdiy ...and HONESTLY..there are NOT enough good books out there on the history of synthesized related topics .

I think that it would be especially cool if you didn't water it down from a technical standpoint .

I'd love to see a history of paia, electronotes , early serge , magazine synths (new order and throbbing gristle both used some diy or kit built synths ) etc (and by the way , electronotes covered TONS of digital as well as analog ..in fact volumes 14 and on are mainly digital /programming but even early volumes have articles on using microprocessors to sequence , create sound , etc --Hal chamberlain even wrote in electronotes

And speaking of which I think Hal's book would be an important milestone as would the BYTE articles on synthesis with computers

ELEKTOR. wireless world . and many other magazines were important as well .

I think if you started really researching this stuff and doing interviews , you'd end up with some really interesting stories

I think a loose definition and picking great topics would be all you would need . and then maybe chart where we are now ..how it led to to the modern day kit/workshop scene

(However I think it's important to not see it as a straight unbroken line from the old sdiy scene to the eventual SDIY mailing list .... that because there wasn't a huge wealth of online synth sites (or wasn't even the WWW) it seems like during the early 90s/late 80s much of the analog synthesis information was not commonly available anymore or was buried . many had retired and or most American synth companies had gone belly up .

Browse over any of the EARLY SDIY mailing list topics and it's almost like people are re-discovering the wheel !

I feel like so much of the knowledge we take for granted now was discussed on THIS VERY LIST ---people figured things out together in public , and shared rare schematics , etc

Just my two cents

Sent from my iPhone

On May 29, 30 Heisei, at 2:53 PM, Roman <modular at go2.pl<mailto:modular at go2.pl>> wrote:

After reading all commets so far I'm not sure if I would back a kickstarter project about SDIY history book. Which seemed like a great idea when I saw the topic at first.
It makes no point arguig what is synth and what is not. Everyone has own definition. Does it makes sound using electricity? Can you make music with it? OK, so a guitar is possibly not a synthesizer, but I would say guitar amp is pretty close. How about calling it MDIY, like music DIY?
Analog or software, what's the difference, someone had to do it him/her-self. Isn't SDIY a freeware synth program made by some hobbyist for fun? Voltage control or any control - why is this a requirement? Isn't simple drone oscillator an example of SDIY? R&D vs DIY - so you wake up one day, without any prior DIY experience, and decide - today I'm gonna start R&D on a smashing commercial hit synthesizer, right? I don't think so. Every kind of DIY can gradually turn into R&D, sometimes after years, when you notice that something you did for fun is possibly a good product to consider making commercially. And what is wrong in making pure DIY stuff using modern tools and services, so it's almost ready to start mass production? If you know how to do it right the first time, why not use that knowledge? Must every true-DIY circuit be made on a stripboard?
How can anything be done yourself without any research and development? Is it only when one starts doing something, not knowing what it will be like, and what will it do anyway? OTOH today SDIY means "put out the componets from the bag and solder to supplied board according to graphical instructions. No schematics included". So yes, that's far from R&D.

Roman

Dnia 29 maja 2018 17:53 Quincas Moreira <quincas at gmail.com<mailto:quincas at gmail.com>> napisał(a):

AFAIK synthesizers began with voltage control. That is, 1957, Don and Bob both designing the first modulars. There are electronic musical instruments that precede the modular of course, but again, for clarity's sake, it's useful to have things well defined.  I think a Synthesizer is an electronic musical instrument or sound design tool made of of different parts which affect each other, via voltage control or other means.
A Theremin doesn't qualify as it's an oscillator and a VCA controlled manually, but don't control affect each other. Similarly a Laboratory Function Generator or Oscillator as were used in early electronic music are not synths, as they have no provision for external control other than a hand turning a knob.

BTW, I can be wrong and am willing to admit it if a compelling counter argument is made. By no means do I propose to have the definitive answer to any of these questions but I find the discussion interesting and stimulating, possibly even meaningful :)

On Tue, May 29, 2018 at 10:35 AM, Florian Anwander <<mailto:fanwander at mnet-online.de>fanwander at mnet-online.de<mailto:fanwander at mnet-online.de>> wrote:
Am 29.05.2018 um 17:23 schrieb Scott Gravenhorst:

  It is
simply "Synthesizer Do It Yourself", a definition in 4 words that I personally find sufficient.
The last 3 words are pretty easy to nail down, but the first is, well, any darn thing we want.
Something "DIY" is very different from "R&D" or even inventing. "DIY" means doing/building somthing yourself which you could buy too.

So Synth-DIY can't start befor the existence of synths produced and sold under industrial or at least economical conditions.

Florian

--
http://www.florian-anwander.de

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Quincas Moreira
Test Pilot at VBrazil Modular
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