171–180 of 351 posts
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He has support from his family.
For sure, but I bet not all kids with support from their family do cool things. Or put it in the other way, you have to prove yourself worthy before getting any fund (even from parents).
Whenever this comes up I like to say it would be nice to reinvent small scale chip fab with less toxic materials if possible.
What are the toxic chemicals used in chip fab? (serious question) I have literally all the chemicals mentioned in the first chart on this page in my modest maker garage, sans arsenic and phosphine; though anyone with certain rat poisons would have them. There doesn't seem anything more toxic than what you would find in your run-of-the-mill chemical research lab. One time I got to handle a few liters of trimethylsilyl…
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It's hard to compete with FAANG, Finance, and Consulting. Unfortunately, that's where a lot of people end up.
Yes, and that's why we should be taxing the hell out of these companies. It's not just about raising revenue. It's about allowing other companies to compete with them.
I'm more interested how he managed to master the knowledge of chip manufacturing plus a ton of electronics repairs (see his microscope and other equipment) at such an early age. Very admirable. Look at what he did: > Photolithography machines are expensive—up to $150 million—and so Zeloof made his own by bolting a modified conference room projector bought on Amazon onto a microscope. It projects his designs at tiny s…
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That means that country that will do that will not have competitive big tech companies and other countries will have. Also, big companies are needed because there are technologies that cannot be produced by small companies. I do not understand recent tendency to make them look bad. Big companies are good for country and economy. Punishing companies for success is harmful for the progress. I think letting market decid…
This is not a recent trend. America has had a big political issue over large industry since day one. The Jeffersonian vision of a nation of yeoman farmers (who maybe owned slaves) vs. an industrial economy built on science and technology. This shows up in debates over railroads (anti-trust laws start here). It leads to the financing of canals, and cars (more democratic forms of transportation). It leads to subsidies…
I don't see what makes cars more "democratic" or anti-trust as firmly on the "yeoman" side of things.
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At least in the US, they're generally limited to salaries on the "general schedule", and management gets paid more than technical people, because "it wouldn't be fair" to have subordinates that make more than you. So there's a built-in glass ceiling for tech careers. https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/pay-leave/salaries...
Maybe “it’s not fair to have subordinates earn more” was the justification given to you, but businesses rarely make decisions based on what’s fair. Engineers are valuable, but individual engineers are largely replaceable. Being able to coordinate a large group successfully also has a lot of value.
Intra-firm compensation is not nearly as "rational" as you are making it out to be.
Anybody has a good estimate of how much this kind of home fab can cost? I am trying to do this in my own apartment (its going very slowly heh) and I estimate it would be USD100000. USD10000 would be barely believable if I can get that broken electron microscope for the same price he did. ($1000). Seems like the vacuum system would be the most expensive part. Another one would be random consumables (vacuum grease, oil…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RJXio_jpc_Y
He doesn't mention costs directly, but this video covers the facts that they had to do some additional plumbing work, additional electrical work, there's a big-ass voltage transformer he had to acquire, etc.
I also wonder how much the shipping costs were on that machine. Unless they were able to pick it up locally with a rented van, shipping alone might have exceeded the cost of the unit. Shipping pallets of fragile gear with specialized handling constraints is not cheap.
My high school turned down a free electron microscope (a college was getting rid of it, I think) for reasons such as this. Even if you can get the microscope for free there are other costs, space requirements, etc.
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Yes, and that's why we should be taxing the hell out of these companies. It's not just about raising revenue. It's about allowing other companies to compete with them.
That means that country that will do that will not have competitive big tech companies and other countries will have. Also, big companies are needed because there are technologies that cannot be produced by small companies. I do not understand recent tendency to make them look bad. Big companies are good for country and economy. Punishing companies for success is harmful for the progress. I think letting market decid…
Not intrinsically, obviously, as anti-trust clearly shows. I am not anti-big intrinsically, for many of the reasons identified.
But I do think there are obvious downsides to be guarded against. If anything, as technology improves, technological barriers to entry should decrease and less big companies will be needed to work on certain advanced technologies.
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Maybe “it’s not fair to have subordinates earn more” was the justification given to you, but businesses rarely make decisions based on what’s fair. Engineers are valuable, but individual engineers are largely replaceable. Being able to coordinate a large group successfully also has a lot of value.
Think it has a lot more to do with proximity to those controlling the purse-strings. Intra-firm compensation is not nearly as "rational" as you are making it out to be.
I'm more interested how he managed to master the knowledge of chip manufacturing plus a ton of electronics repairs (see his microscope and other equipment) at such an early age. Very admirable. Look at what he did: > Photolithography machines are expensive—up to $150 million—and so Zeloof made his own by bolting a modified conference room projector bought on Amazon onto a microscope. It projects his designs at tiny s…
Think of all the kids who might start working on automotive stuff at 8 years old, building race car parts or engines or go karts. Then imagine the best of the best of thousands of them with parental? resources to build out a great kit and tinker with a lot stuff. This guy is the semiconductor equivalent.
I want my kid to start early on something he is interested in too but I don't really know how to do that. I know the general rules (expose him to a lot of stuffs, watch him do things, etc.) but don't know how to implement them properly. I myself wasted a lot of time in my childhood so I guess that's why I don't know how to do it properly.