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Shenzhen is a hothouse of innovation

economist.com

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Re: Shenzhen is a hothouse of innovation

#4

Post by gjkood »

I was in Shenzhen a few months back for the first time. I can only describe it as Disneyland for electronics enthusiasts.

Going into all the specialized malls in Huaqiang Bei and seeing the entire supply chain in one building is amazing.

Highly recommend that people interested in electronics hardware make a visit.

Re: Shenzhen is a hothouse of innovation

#7

Post by Animats »

The "maker movement" is alive in Shentzen, but mostly dead in Silicon Valley. TechShop is mostly crafters, not people building anything innovative. Hacker Dojo is appslaves. If there's a maker space in Silicon Valley with a pick and place machine, I can't find it.

Re: Shenzhen is a hothouse of innovation

#8

Post by tekklloneer »

Animats wrote: post #7

The "maker movement" is alive in Shentzen, but mostly dead in Silicon Valley. TechShop is mostly crafters, not people building anything innovative. Hacker Dojo is appslaves. If there's a maker space in Silicon Valley with a pick and place machine, I can't find it.

Sudoroom and noisebridge are still alive.

The fact of the matter is that for all of the innovation you hear about there, it's really just romanticizing the margin thinning of existing products. Nothing wrong with that, but it's easy to romanticize.

Re: Shenzhen is a hothouse of innovation

#9

Post by chaostheory »

> The common perception that China is incapable of innovation needs re-examining.

No one is saying Chinese people can't innovate. The real question is whether Chinese people can innovate while inside China. (I wonder what percentage of current captains of industry in China studied abroad?) Why? Because innovation is essentially disrupting and rebelling against the status quo. ie breaking rules, disobedience, opposition to the norm

When you demand that your people bow and obey, and imprison people like A1 WW, this goes against promoting and nurturing innovation

https://steveblank.com/2012/11/06/entrepreneurs-as-dissident...

https://medium.com/@they_made_that/innovations-secret-ingred...

http://www.salon.com/2014/10/22/never_before_published_isaac...

When your culture is very antagonistic towards people who don't like the status quo and forces them to carefully think about what they say and write, the culture itself becomes a big obstacle to innovation. When you run garbage likethe Great Firewall that limits the sharing of information, that's another strike against innovation. (Of course one way to mitigate the effects of authoritarian rule is by being really favorable towards immigration from places with the opposite culture.)

I guess Shenzen is a place that's figuratively where "the mountains are high and the emperor is far away". I wonder how long before that changes?

Re: Shenzhen is a hothouse of innovation

#10

Post by arbuge »

Animats wrote: post #7

The "maker movement" is alive in Shentzen, but mostly dead in Silicon Valley. TechShop is mostly crafters, not people building anything innovative. Hacker Dojo is appslaves. If there's a maker space in Silicon Valley with a pick and place machine, I can't find it.

Pick and place machines are used for volume pcb production - not the kind of thing one would expect to find in your average maker space AFAIK.
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