There Is No Maker Movement in China • Hacker News Board

Re: There Is No Maker Movement in China

#91

Post by jff » Tue, Oct 07, 2014, 4:39 PM UTC

VLM wrote: post #82

ZenoArrow wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The central premise of this article was not that the maker community doesn't exist in China, the central premise is that because it "never went away" the maker culture of China has evolved further than what you might find elsewhere. But even that I disagree with. Not on the impressive infrastructure that China seems to have for makers (which is worthy of envy, in my opinion), but on the "never went away" point, becau…

I agree with your remarks in that I have noticed on ham radio sites some of the hams publicly not being very happy to be told they had gone away and what they spent the 70s, 80s, 90s doing didn't exist. "I'm a ham radio home brewer and I'm not a maker" and stuff like that. I would disagree, or at least extend your remarks in an alternate direction, in that the modern maker movement from the outside looks like kids an…

That's why I don't call myself a "maker". It's all about wanking each other over your kickass 3d-printed steampunk goggles, while the technical meat of "maker" projects is usually less interesting that things people were doing in the 70s.

I was soldering robots at 12 using schematics I found online. I didn't go to any fucking makerfaires, they didn't even exist yet, I just read a lot and I learned how to do it myself. I built a trebuchet in high school using parts from the hardware store and some scrap steel I welded together--I had to learn arc welding to do it. I do electronics and woodworking and automotive/motorcycle projects all the time, but I'll never call myself a maker.

Re: There Is No Maker Movement in China

#92

Post by chaostheory » Tue, Oct 07, 2014, 4:57 PM UTC

1stop wrote: post #70

chaostheory wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> China has 1.35 billion people, and it seems incredibly unimaginative and frankly egotistic to think that you can make generalizations about overall Chinese culture Ok I'm open to being wrong. How about proving me wrong? What parts of my description of Chinese culture are wrong? For one thing it's a pessimistic society hence the photocopy culture (why take a crazy risk for something unknown and original when I can j…

This comment just reads as a passive-aggressive racist rant. Do you really think people in China do not share? Do you really think Chinese are 'used' to obeying 'emporers'? Is that because they did 100 years ago? Which emperor do they follow now? (if you answer is the CCP or Xijinping, how is that different to Congress/Obama?) Is buying a movie off iTunes for $10 more of a rebellion against institutions than p2p-stre…

> This comment just reads as a passive-aggressive racist rant.

I did not post a racist rant. I'm Chinese. Unlike you I'm not blinded by nationalistic, ethnic pride. I'm more open to self-examination of our culture. Apparently to you anything legitimately critical of Chinese culture is 'racist' even though I've posted specific points.

> Do you really think Chinese are 'used' to obeying 'emporers'? Is that because they did 100 years ago? Which emperor do they follow now? (if you answer is the CCP or Xijinping, how is that different to Congress/Obama?)

Xijinping ascended to his throne. Conversely Obama and our Congress are elected officials.

> Do you really think people in China do not share?

Yes when it comes to family. No when it comes to everyone else. This is because it's still a developing nation. Unlike here, most people don't have the relative luxury of an easy life with a decent social net. Who can blame them?

> Is buying a movie off iTunes for $10 more of a rebellion against institutions than p2p-streaming it over PPS?

I think you're forgetting that both P2P and torrents were created here and not in China. Moreover, torrenting is still pretty popular here.

You're right about BYD, but Tencent is just yet another copy cat machine. Tencent's main differentiation is the scope and range of copycatting, and no not all of it is from the West since S Korea and Japan are so close by.

You haven't really disproved that mainland China has an overall culture of obey and follow. The reason that there's not many people who don't fit the opposite mold over there is because most of them left the mainland a long time ago. It was natural for us, since we are descendants of pirates.

Re: There Is No Maker Movement in China

#93

Post by psykovsky » Tue, Oct 07, 2014, 7:14 PM UTC

yaiu wrote: post #67

The font on this websight makes this totally unreadable...

So, you can't call it a websight at all...

Re: There Is No Maker Movement in China

#94

Post by noselasd » Tue, Oct 07, 2014, 7:16 PM UTC

v-yadli wrote: post #53

rdtsc wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok as the gp pointed out. Where are the thousands of open source projects on Github written by Chinese? > China has 1.35 billion people, and it seems incredibly unimaginative and frankly egotistic Surely, by your own suggestion, there should be countless examples of open source projects driven from there. Otherwise, their point (even in its generalized form) still stands.

You have to make them speak English first. I mean, for the majority of Chinese people, they don't care about your Github thing... Edit: I'd suggest you do some research on this: where's all the information hiding in the Chinese internet? - An interesting example is this: http://www.pudn.com/ It works different. Yes you can download stuff for free there, but you have to upload your own stuff to gain credit. It's just…

https://code.csdn.net would be a better example. www.pudn.com is where I go looking for code and docs that aren't really supposed to be "open" in any sense.

Re: There Is No Maker Movement in China

#95

Post by eru » Tue, Oct 07, 2014, 10:51 PM UTC

cflee wrote: post #74

eru wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sim Lim tower is actually better for maker stuff than Sim Lim square. The two are just across the street from each other. (I hope I'm not mixing them up.)

You're correct. Sim Lim Tower is where the electronic/electrical stuff is, Sim Lim Square has the computer parts and electronics (cameras etc). But in Singapore, the mother lode is probably Koba Electronics[1] in Chinatown.. [1] http://dangerousprototypes.com/2012/08/06/global-geek-tour-s...

Thanks. I'll check out Koba when I'm there over Chinese New Year.

Around the Sim Lims (and across the island) you also have lots of small hardware shops.

Re: There Is No Maker Movement in China

#96

Post by v-yadli » Wed, Oct 08, 2014, 2:00 AM UTC

chaostheory wrote: post #81

v-yadli wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have to make them speak English first. I mean, for the majority of Chinese people, they don't care about your Github thing... Edit: I'd suggest you do some research on this: where's all the information hiding in the Chinese internet? - An interesting example is this: http://www.pudn.com/ It works different. Yes you can download stuff for free there, but you have to upload your own stuff to gain credit. It's just…

> All the things you talk about, you have to think whether they stand, first. I'm pretty damn sure I know what I'm talking about. For one thing, I'm not blinded by pride. (Going on a tangent, I don't even understand why people seem offended, since this isn't about talent or skill that a lot of mainlanders possess, this is simply about their culture.) Pudn is a horrible example of Chinese 'open source' because it's no…

I have no idea why you assume that pudn is an example of 'open source' to me. I'm just talking about information. Do you get this now? You are again interpreting my words with a predefined, well, interpreter. Yes I agree with you that open source (in a western perspective somehow) doesn't work in China, as I have stated above, just like they don't care about Github. It means that the collaboration, copy right awareness, etc, etc, they just don't exist.

Months ago I released some kernel patches for Xperia Z2 on github. Nobody forks it or send me pull requests. I then released kernel images to both XDA and a forum in China. It got so hot that even today there're still 100+ replies a day under my thread. Of course in a Chinese-'zombie'-style like "fawefawiefuawsef" to satisfy "reply to download".

You can see how information flows... Someone releases something. Tens of thousands of end users rush to it and disrupt the ambience of communication. Makers then hide themselves, and turn to do something else. Of course sometimes they don't face end users directly. They have their own community (but usually formed as an instant message group or so) and release stuff through delegates, who are usually mods of forums.

Chinese forums is an interesting thing definitely worth taking a look at. Most hardware modders post things there ranging from vehicle modding to custom guitar stomps.

Re: There Is No Maker Movement in China

#97

Post by ZenoArrow » Wed, Oct 08, 2014, 2:44 AM UTC

VLM wrote: post #82

ZenoArrow wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The central premise of this article was not that the maker community doesn't exist in China, the central premise is that because it "never went away" the maker culture of China has evolved further than what you might find elsewhere. But even that I disagree with. Not on the impressive infrastructure that China seems to have for makers (which is worthy of envy, in my opinion), but on the "never went away" point, becau…

I agree with your remarks in that I have noticed on ham radio sites some of the hams publicly not being very happy to be told they had gone away and what they spent the 70s, 80s, 90s doing didn't exist. "I'm a ham radio home brewer and I'm not a maker" and stuff like that. I would disagree, or at least extend your remarks in an alternate direction, in that the modern maker movement from the outside looks like kids an…

You understood correctly what I referred to by rebranding, it was the artistic element and the welcoming element that was added. These are changes that can bring a lot of positives. I remember being fascinated by electronics as a kid, to me they were like advanced Lego, but I didn't have the resources until much later in order to make a dent in understanding it. The situation is better now.

Ham radio enthusiasts were certainly one part of what kept making technology alive, but they weren't the only group. Let me put it this way, who was buying electronic components from RadioShack in the 80s?

Re: There Is No Maker Movement in China

#98

Post by HeyLaughingBoy » Wed, Oct 08, 2014, 9:33 PM UTC

chaostheory wrote: post #87

msie wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the "We here in the Maker movement could not be more pleased with ourselves" vibe. This is another of way of saying that we enjoy making here beyond earning a living. I didn't see it that way. To me it meant: "we are pleased with ourselves that we are not just helpless consumers but also creators and self-reliant". We are smug with our technical know-how. Another form of machismo.

If that's what cshirky meant, he's is just totally and completely wrong on several major things.

Maybe, but I came to the same conclusion quite some time ago.

I saw the whole Maker movement with a kind of bemused "why is this news" kind of attitude because I (and many of the people I knew) had made things our entire lives and it never seemed in any way noteworthy. It was quite a surprise to find that there were actually people who found DIY to be an alien concept.

Re: There Is No Maker Movement in China

#99

Post by HeyLaughingBoy » Wed, Oct 08, 2014, 10:04 PM UTC

gambiting wrote: post #69

"Hardware hacking hasn't become a hot new thing in China because it never stopped being a regular old thing." - I feel like buying regular bread is already this in many places. Where I come from (Poland) there are bakeries in every town, you can buy regular, sour dough bread and rolls, cakes and pastries for very very cheap. However, since I've moved to the UK I noticed that people are so used to buying horrible foil…

Ugh! You struck a nerve.

I make bread regularly. It's not a big deal, my mom did it, and probably her mom before her, etc. If we're out of bread, it's not too hot to run the oven and I feel like it, I make bread.

But then my mother-in-law comes over and can't stop raving about the bread and if there isn't any, asking if I'm going to "make that wonderful bread" and fawning over it to the point where I'm ready to puke. It's just bread, FFS. Any idiot can learn to make it.

Re: There Is No Maker Movement in China

#100

Post by chaostheory » Thu, Oct 09, 2014, 2:12 AM UTC

v-yadli wrote: post #96

chaostheory wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> All the things you talk about, you have to think whether they stand, first. I'm pretty damn sure I know what I'm talking about. For one thing, I'm not blinded by pride. (Going on a tangent, I don't even understand why people seem offended, since this isn't about talent or skill that a lot of mainlanders possess, this is simply about their culture.) Pudn is a horrible example of Chinese 'open source' because it's no…

I have no idea why you assume that pudn is an example of 'open source' to me. I'm just talking about information. Do you get this now? You are again interpreting my words with a predefined, well, interpreter. Yes I agree with you that open source (in a western perspective somehow) doesn't work in China, as I have stated above, just like they don't care about Github. It means that the collaboration, copy right awarene…

> I'd suggest you do some research on this: where's all the information hiding in the Chinese internet? It's just that, things work quite different here in China...

In your posts (the previous one and your last one) you were essentially saying that mainland Chinese do things differently, but it was just as good. Well I've listed specific reasons as to why it's not as good as the way things are in the West.

Your current example about 100 replies to your post is like the number of projects on csdn.net; it's just not impressive like other things in China like the pace and scope of Chinese construction (e.g. the 3 Gorges dam) or China's ambition for manned moon landings... and again it has nothing to do with skill or talent. It's just mainland Chinese culture.