Nice to see an article about China here. When I read Fred Wilson or Paul Graham I always wonder what they think about China and all the weird stuff happening in this country, but they seem either uninterested or deaf.
Meet a Shenzhen Maker: Mr. Chen
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Re: Meet a Shenzhen Maker: Mr. Chen
#42In the UK there is a show called "The Jeremy Kyle Show". where stupid ugly people come on stage to blame each other for various family squabbles in the name of entertainment. I caught 30 secs of it just after watching the OP video and realised that the old refrain "stealing our jobs" is not true - the Jeremy Kyle show fodder did not and would never have a job as a short run PCB manufacturer. I do not know how we will…
I believe that in former times the number of uneducated people with few skills were much higher than today. Unlike today there were plenty of jobs for those who had no education nor skills. Only the difficulty with finding gainful employment for those people - and the need for founders, makers etc. - draws our attention to them in the first place (a microtrend of glorification of those people through shows like the one you've mentioned nonwithstanding).
Regarding the upper class who does not work that maybe the trust fund kids?
Re: Meet a Shenzhen Maker: Mr. Chen
#43Reading stories about Shenzhen makes me terrified for the future of electrical engineering in the United States. Here in Silicon Valley I often have to wait a week to get a board fabbed and another week to get it assembled. I usually have to order the parts myself from Digikey, which takes a few days, and then manually build the kits. If something goes wrong during the bring up, I need to either spend boatloads of mo…
If you are building a product, you don't really want to be using rare ICs. When you are making a decent number, you don't want to always be hunting for reliable suppliers (i.e. counterfeited SD cards http://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?page_id=1022 ). I like that when I'm buying parts from Digikey, I get what I actually ordered. When or if I want to take my chances and cut costs, I have the option to have it built ove…
You could also move to Thief River Falls :)
I laughed at that, even with the smiley. I live about 6 hours from Thief River Falls (home of DigiKey) and it's about -12F here right now at 7:30AM. Just checked the Thief River Falls weather and it's a balmy -24F there right now.
I don't think we'll be seeing a flood of Bay Area HN'ers moving here any time soon :-)
Re: Meet a Shenzhen Maker: Mr. Chen
#44Earlier quoted context omitted.
Silicon Valley rent prices and living costs make it impossible to ever be competitive with China in EE manufacturing. But not only China, also Taiwan, Korea, Japan and even parts of Europe and the rest of the US. Nothing wrong with it though. This only sustains because there are more profitable industries there now.
Bigger problem is that Americans don't understand high density living. That's going to take a few generations.
The one thing I loved when first coming to the US was how spread out and spacious everything was (compared to most European cities), bar NYC. It's amazing how you Americans strive to change exactly the things that foreigners absolutely love about your country... for me "high density living" is a mind wrecking nightmare that only those with the "hypesocial city rat" personality type can enjoy...
Re: Meet a Shenzhen Maker: Mr. Chen
#45Earlier quoted context omitted.
Bigger problem is that Americans don't understand high density living. That's going to take a few generations.
The one thing I loved when first coming to the US was how spread out and spacious everything was (compared to most European cities), bar NYC. It's amazing how you Americans strive to change exactly the things that foreigners absolutely love about your country... for me "high density living" is a mind wrecking nightmare that only those with the "hypesocial city rat" personality type can enjoy...
Depleting oil reserves are quickly forcing this change.
I'd take "medium" density any day though. Enough density so people don't need to move miles daily, not enough density so people can't afford some healthy living space. NYC and SanFran are way over the top.
Re: Meet a Shenzhen Maker: Mr. Chen
#46Reading stories about Shenzhen makes me terrified for the future of electrical engineering in the United States. Here in Silicon Valley I often have to wait a week to get a board fabbed and another week to get it assembled. I usually have to order the parts myself from Digikey, which takes a few days, and then manually build the kits. If something goes wrong during the bring up, I need to either spend boatloads of mo…
It's really irritating - whenever I'm in China, I feel like I'm in a desert of the free information (see: GFW & Github) and when I'm in the US I'm in a desert of accessible components for EE work. Now that I'm out of college, and have a better idea of what a EE builders paradise looks like, I should see if Taiwan bridges the gap here.
Taiwan is great. I loved walking around Neihu in Taipei and seeing all the brand names in components right there, plus others you don't know because they make the stuff other companies brand.
Re: Meet a Shenzhen Maker: Mr. Chen
#47Reading stories about Shenzhen makes me terrified for the future of electrical engineering in the United States. Here in Silicon Valley I often have to wait a week to get a board fabbed and another week to get it assembled. I usually have to order the parts myself from Digikey, which takes a few days, and then manually build the kits. If something goes wrong during the bring up, I need to either spend boatloads of mo…
It's really irritating - whenever I'm in China, I feel like I'm in a desert of the free information (see: GFW & Github) and when I'm in the US I'm in a desert of accessible components for EE work. Now that I'm out of college, and have a better idea of what a EE builders paradise looks like, I should see if Taiwan bridges the gap here.
I'm in Taiwan, and they really really really trying to bridge the gap here. Because it's a small country (23million people), the entrepreneurial opportunities are different, and most people are looking towards China instead as a big market for all kinds of things they make.
Having said that, I love being here (physicist at a local research institute), where there are places like Guanghua computer market, basically most electronics imaginable http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guang_Hua_Digital_Plaza
Many of the things are still harder to get (e.g. I'd love to have in country source for the Atmel chips that are used in Arduinos), but loads of things are so cheap and ready to grab.
Just trying to get Taipei Hackerspace off the ground, to bridge the gap between the local opportunities and the vision that is quite often got imported by foreigners here. It's an explosive combination, I really want to help this forward, and see it to succeed. :)
Come visit sometime!
Re: Meet a Shenzhen Maker: Mr. Chen
#48Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's really irritating - whenever I'm in China, I feel like I'm in a desert of the free information (see: GFW & Github) and when I'm in the US I'm in a desert of accessible components for EE work. Now that I'm out of college, and have a better idea of what a EE builders paradise looks like, I should see if Taiwan bridges the gap here.
I'm in Taiwan, and they really really really trying to bridge the gap here. Because it's a small country (23million people), the entrepreneurial opportunities are different, and most people are looking towards China instead as a big market for all kinds of things they make. Having said that, I love being here (physicist at a local research institute), where there are places like Guanghua computer market, basically mo…
I've heard that Korea is similar, but with even higher-quality manufacturing. Do you know if this is true?
I'd love to come visit next time I'm around China. Send me an email and we'll connect?
Re: Meet a Shenzhen Maker: Mr. Chen
#49Reading stories about Shenzhen makes me terrified for the future of electrical engineering in the United States. Here in Silicon Valley I often have to wait a week to get a board fabbed and another week to get it assembled. I usually have to order the parts myself from Digikey, which takes a few days, and then manually build the kits. If something goes wrong during the bring up, I need to either spend boatloads of mo…
You might be interested in http://www.haxlr8r.com . From their website: "HAXLR8R is a new kind of accelerator program. For people who hack hardware and make things. Join us for 111 days in Shenzhen, China and San Francisco."
He (Zack, the author of the article) is involved in HAXLR8R. He's actually the Program Director. Or I guess you meant the parent comment.