Ignoring Useless Legislation

I guess I’ve always known how afraid people are of the police without really recognizing it. In discussing my knight rider lights with some fellow electrical engineering students it came to my full attention. More than one person cautioned that I might get in trouble for somehow breaking some unstated laws about car lights.

When I brought up the fact that I’ve already done some research on what colors and quantities of lights are permitted, the next problem raised would be that I would be somehow, believe it or not, impersonating a police officer because my lights would make other drivers think I was an officer.

Why are our laws so mysterious and why do regular people live in such fear of them? A better question is, why should the people who are making awesome things even worry about over-protective legislation when creating things? The answer is, they shouldn’t. When you do something, be it science or just plain tinkering, the law comes second and maybe even third. I’m not saying to have no regard for laws at all, some are there for a reason. Others, like the law about wearing a helmet on a bicycle, are just politicians trying to think for us. What it comes down to is common sense; maybe even what I would call these days non-common sense.

As someone who makes something, think for 32.6 seconds before you unleash your creation upon the world. You need to ask yourself: in the environment that my creation will be used, will my creation be excessively dangerous to the people trained to use it? Will it harm innocent bystanders?

I am not talking freak accidents - nothing can really avoid those, that is why they are called freak accidents. What I am talking about here are things like shooting a gun straight up in the air in a crowded city. That is just stupid. Other things like slowly moving lights are not dangerous in any way. If you are the kind of person who can be fatally distracted by a moving light, get off the road. Darwinism baby - if you’re too stupid to survive then everyone else shouldn’t have to baby you.

Bottom line here, the people inventing and pushing the boundaries of things shouldn’t worry about moronic laws that are only there so that politicians can feel good about themselves. Ignore the “what about the children?” laws. Will you get a ticket for it? Possibly, but that is just a small price to pay for being ahead of the curve.

Putting your life online

Someone mentioned to me recently that I “put my entire life online”. The thing is, I don’t; I am not that crazy. I am of the opinion that if someone goes looking for me online, they should fine me not someone posting smack about me. I really only put stuff online that I have no problem with people knowing.

I purposely use my real name with regards to things like electronics and web development. I want to be known in these fields. I have other handles for doing things that have no relation to my chosen fields of focus and those will remain disconnected from my real name. I have multiple “identities” like everyone else. I also use my real name with certain political organizations because I feel that if you support something you should do it whole-heartedly and part of that is taking off the anonymity when you can - I am not ashamed of my views. If you are ashamed of yours, then they probably aren’t really your views or you’re not being true to yourself.

On another note, it used to be that you got your recognition from your local paper, or from a few people you’ve worked with in the past. Now it is that plus more. The internet these days can be the ultimate peer review, and I want it known that I have been reviewed by my peers and found to have worth.

The Aftermath

It is the morning after Robot House Party 3, people are sleeping on the floor and things are a total mess - but it was a blast. I exaggerate slightly, only three people that don’t live at the Robot House slept over and they slept on couches and such not the floor.

Turnout was fairly nice. We had a good average of 20 people here until about 12:30AM-1:00AM. After that time, it dropped down to about six or so and we moved outside. We have the entire party (well, most of it) recorded on ustream and it just needs to be finalized and displayed somewhere. I have no idea if we will ever watch any of it, but it was a rather fun concept and we had a good half dozen people watching us have fun online. I’d stream out future parties without a doubt. This is the Robot House after all and it must maintain a certain level of technology about it.

I was inspired by one of our guests whose name I don’t remember. He wasn’t really “into” electrical engineering or anything like that, but he wanted to build a replica Iron Man arc reactor. So he did it. He even etched his own boards and learned what he needed to learn to be able to make his device; it looks fantastic. He is on his second or third version of it and I have to say that I was impressed. He basically started with a standard arduino, got the software working, and then built himself a board for it and dropped the micro-controller from the arduino into his board.

That made me wonder why I don’t get off my butt and etch my own boards. It should be fairly straight forward to do. The only thing I really have to work on is getting a little more proficient with EagleCAD but that really is a nonissue since there are so many tutorials and guides on how to use it. The question now is, what to build? I suppose I could start with making an arc reactor. Although, instead of using through-hole LEDs I would go SMD just to challenge my soldering skills. I’ll have to check the price of RGB ones because that would be just awesome.

I am definitely enjoying Chyrp and I think that I will transfer my primary domains (ryanfaerman.com, faerman.net) over to it.

RadioShack should be called CrapShack

Once upon a time, the electronics enthusiast could drop by their local RadioShack and pick up a few components, and have those parts work most of the time. That golden age is no more. I have had nothing of any sort of quality other than crap, come from RadioShack.

Most recently, I had purchased a small (4” x 2”) prototype board. I go to use it, and after soldering on a few items, the traces start lifting up! And this isn’t because I am being hot-handed with the soldering iron either. I am not new to soldering, and I have NEVER had traces lift on me. But these were just coming right off the board. I couldn’t even continue to use the board and now I have to postpone my project until I can get a good prototype board.

Before this, I had purchased a set of needle nosed pliers from them. Why buy from RadioShack and not from a real hardware store? Because I was there, and it was convenient. I start using it, and it’s going great. Then lacking things to ply, (get it… pliers… ply… eh, not very funny) I decide to squeeze the edge of my desk a little, to see if it makes a mark. What happens? One of the arms on the pliers side just falls off. I mean the damn thing snapped in half! From squeezing some pine.

Pliers should be able to take a little bit of resistance without breaking. They are pliers, a hand tool. Not a little boys plastic set (which are probably better built than those pliers).

Additionally, RadioShack is becoming one of those places that just has lots of useless junk. Would someone really go to RadioShack to buy a TV? It is a “shack”. Shack does not imply quality.

What do people go to RadioShack for? I mean… what do they offer? Their sales people don’t know squat, their prices are high, and they never seem to have what you need or want. You can get most of the same stuff at any standard store (your KMart, Wal-Mart or Target). And for a television, why would someone not just go to BestBuy or a real full-sized electronics store? Why would someone go to a shack for radios, to buy a TV? It makes no sense.

I will admit, there is one good product I have purchased from RadioShack. A $6 small electrostatic safe screwdriver set. I use it all the time, and it hasn’t broken on me yet. And no, I did not just get it this afternoon. I’ve had it at least a year or so.

Oh, and the pliers that broke - I replaced it with a $7 set, from the company Kobalt which I bought from Lowes. I think its their house brand. The set came with five pliers and a wire cutter in a zipper case. A damn good deal for the quality (which isn’t too bad).

On a final note, RadioShack needs to change their catch-phrase from “You’ve got questions. We’ve got answers.” to “You’ve got questions. We still have no clue.”