Comment by atoav
8 hours ago
Yes. And thus using a circuit that has the complexity of a circuit one would put onto a circuit board would be a good demonstration. E.g. showcasing vias and other circuit board technologies.
Understandably the first step is to start simple, but that is the essence of my criticism: Too many of these projects become viral hits that stop making any progress after the first symbolic success. Cynics would say these projects all too often stop exactly at the point where the actual challenges start.
And as someone who cares about the environment, I am not sure how I feel about a hundred symbolic projects that go nowhere. Are the substrates of PCBs really the problem? What if people have to throw entire devices with mud PCBs into the bin after a year because the mud PCB couldn't handle the vibration and humidity? Is that environmentally sound?
I'd love to someone really explore alternative PCB materials. But that means living in reality and compsring the whole lifecycle of the result to existing technologies. A automotive tire made of mud is also environmentally sound. It is just that it falls apart after half a block.
You’re bringing so much weird baggage to this. A viral hit? This is a ~2,300 word piece, equivalent to an article in The Atlantic introducing a 30 page PDF tutorial and code repo which is ran as a workshop in hacker spaces and at conferences. It isn’t a proposal for a new scale industrial process seeking VC funding.
You’re critiquing it for not being something you value, but it isn’t trying to be that thing. They’re not doing the thing you think they are badly, they’re doing something you haven’t bothered to understand.
Honestly, I think the only way one could look at this and bring that critique is if they both didn’t look at shit but the pictures and saw the word “feminist” used and began to intellectually infantilize the authors.
> Too many of these projects become viral hits that stop making any progress after the first symbolic success. Cynics would say these projects all too often stop exactly at the point where the actual challenges start.
What can you do to ensure the "real work" can actually be done, more precise paid for? Well, you could demo early in hope to attract coins. Maybe that is happening here.