Re: [IRCA] Radio shack to file for bankruptcy

[Russ Edmunds <wb2bjh@xxxxxxxxx>]

Where I was going was more or less the same place. But if you're a gamer or
a hacker or whatever, sure you learn yourself, but there isn't a whole lot
you need to buy that RS has. There isn't a lot to buy period. What we were
mostly into involved a lot of hardware of various kinds. What most of the
younger folks today are doing is still loosely electronics in that it's
with computers, but they aren't going to RS. Technical creativity as you
put it is appropriate. It's just a whole different ballgame now.

On Fri, Jan 16, 2015 at 11:59 AM, Nick Hall-Patch <nhp@xxxxxxxx> wrote:

> An OT philosophical discussion.....I'd be curious about the figures for
> electronic DIYers, Russ.  Does one exclude those who fiddle with
> microcontrollers (see magazines like Circuit Cellar or Elektor), monkey
> with Linux, hack the Pentagon?   It's not particularly DX or even hardware
> oriented, of course, but DIY I think it is.  It may be a smaller percentage
> of the population than 50 years ago, but I wonder.   I've run into younger
> people who work as game developers, and I don't think they started by
> taking professional training as game developers, they DIYed....it's just
> that they didn't need a drill and a soldering iron to do it.
>
> Of course, our work world relies far less on hand oriented tech skills
> than it once did also.   Yet, there are these "maker spaces" that allow the
> DIYer access to tools that a small home workshop might not have, something
> I might have appreciated in own younger days.  (who knows what goes on in
> China?  The fact that Tecsun put out a kit that is essentially one of their
> DSP ultralights on a board makes me wonder, as the market in America can't
> have been great)
>
> Even in the good ol' days, far more DIYers modified their cars than played
> with radios from what I can recall, so we've always been a minority.    But
> the day I heard somebody's phone cheep out "SMS" in Morse code was the day
> I realized that maybe at least the ham techies had taken over the world in
> a small way, hi.  (how often do we see the schematic symbol for an antenna
> in a public environment, speaking of phones?   That was pretty arcane
> stuff, something you'd see on the cover of the ARRL Handbook, when I was
> first making smoke with electronic components.)
>
> Having spouted all that, I suspect there are fewer hot iron types....but
> the spirit that drove those types now drives different forms of technical
> creativity.
>
> best wishes,
>
> Nick
>
>
>
>
> At 19:16 15-01-15, you wrote:
>
>> I doubt that their old paradigm is workable today. Just as the number of
>> radio hobbyists - hams, DX'ers, SWL's - is shrinking,
>> so is the pool of electronics DIY'ers. A lot of the DIY market implosion
>> results from advanced circuitry moving beyond more and
>> more people who lack the type of technical knowledge to continue.
>>
>
>
>
>
>
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-- 
Russ Edmunds
15 mi NW Phila
Grid FN20id
<wb2bjh@xxxxxxxxx>

AM: Modified Sony ICF2010's (2) barefoot w/whip
FM: Yamaha T-80 & T-85, each w/ Conrad RDS Decoder;
Onkyo T-450RDS; Tecsun PL-310 ( 2);
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