Make: Noise — Discuss this article

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• Non Specific Rant
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  I feel that there’s a strong pressure by big business to impose limitations on people. As we’ve seen, companies don’t want their products taken apart or their programs analyzed. They copyright programs and patent genetic code because they want to control us, they want us to conform. “Don’t open the case,” they say, “don’t look at the code; don’t try to make it better; just use it.”
  
  Making is a form of rebellion. You pick up your arc welder, soldering iron, or go to your key board and say “Hey, I’m going to do it myself.” And you do. You make whatever you need. And it’s not always practical. There’s no problem with that. Practicality is an outdated notion that belongs on the factory floor, and not in your work space. The other day I saw a video in which a guy had rigged his refrigerator to throw him a beer. There was some sort of catapult involved, and it flung the can across the room to the couch, where he caught it. It was absurd and probably somewhat dangerous. No one could ever market a device like that. But at the same time it was awesome because it was an authentic expression of that guy’s personality. That’s what making is about, you imagine and create things that are in tune with who you are. People should be free to do that.
  
  In Live Dangerously, Friedrich Nietzsche suggests that individuals must give style to their character, comprehending everything into an artistic plan, where even weakness is seen as a strength. Making is kind of like that. The maker chooses to create, and perhaps sacrifices something in the way of aesthetics to do it. But at the same time, his or her creation is more beautiful than any similar product that has been team designed, streamlined, polished, and marketed, because it is an expression of self, a piece of art that says “This is who what I am.”
  -Coggzzwell

  Posted by Coggzzwell on April 30, 2007 at 19:50:25 Pacific Time