
There Is No Maker Movement in China - paulgerhardt
https://ello.co/cshirky/post/FQKBh4QMjfaqBM1C4XYnjw
======
chaostheory
I strongly disagree with this post and the author's opinions on Chinese
culture. He's missing something really big that's a core of Chinese culture.

> the "We here in the Maker movement could not be more pleased with ourselves"
> vibe.

This is another of way of saying that we enjoy making here beyond earning a
living. Yes it's work, but it's also recreation and art. In places like SV and
NY, people make because mainly it's fun.

Over there, 'making' is not really something you enjoy; it's a means to an
end. It's something you have to do to make money or save money, which in turn
provides for your family and increases your reputation the more money you
accumulate. The key point is that there's no love for a trade because nothing
else really matters aside from family including your personal hobbies.
Therefore on a whole there's no 'maker culture'. If something doesn't make you
money for your family, there's no point. There's no doing something just
because it's cool and not practical. It must be practical. (This imo is
another reason why Chinese open source is anemic.) Add to this the repression
of free expression and the work and school hours that are the longer than
here, and what you get is a focus more on making copies and knockoffs of name
brands (something safe) instead of something truly Chinese like say this:

[http://www.atlasobscura.com/places/robots-of-wu-
yulu](http://www.atlasobscura.com/places/robots-of-wu-yulu) The main reason
I've always remembered this man is because he's one of the few Chinese people
in China (that I'm aware of) who actually enjoys making for the sake of
making, and not just as a livelihood. You can see the pride in his work.

In general their dreams aren't to change the world with something cool. It's
to make enough money to send their family off to the US or Canada, where the
water and air are cleaner...

I can go on and on with this subject. Yes maybe things are slowly changing in
small pockets of places like Shanghai where there's a lot of Western expats,
but on a whole what I've described is accurate.

~~~
taurath
> The main reason I've always remembered this man is because he's one of the
> few Chinese people in China (that I'm aware of) who actually enjoys making
> for the sake of making, and not just as a livelihood.

China has 1.35 billion people, and it seems incredibly unimaginative and
frankly egotistic to think that you can make generalizations about overall
Chinese culture and then just call it a day. The fact is that even "maker"
culture in the US where its currently being celebrated (because it makes
people money) is made up of a very small percentage of people working in North
America - you would not meet nor have heard of a large group of people "making
things for the sake of making" in China but it doesn't mean that they don't
exist.

~~~
chaostheory
> China has 1.35 billion people, and it seems incredibly unimaginative and
> frankly egotistic to think that you can make generalizations about overall
> Chinese culture

Ok I'm open to being wrong. How about proving me wrong? What parts of my
description of Chinese culture are wrong? For one thing it's a pessimistic
society hence the photocopy culture (why take a crazy risk for something
unknown and original when I can just use someone else's safe and proven
ideas?) and lack of open source (why share when I don't immediately benefit
while others will for free?).

> The fact is that even "maker" culture in the US where its currently being
> celebrated (because it makes people money) is made up of a very small
> percentage of people working in North America

I agree about the small and minority part, people here are mostly about
consumption and that needs to change. However, I strongly disagree about the
'because it makes people money' part. You're confusing the West with China. On
a whole, people in the maker culture do it for the love and not as a job or
lucrative opportunity. Most of the things being made seem unwanted and not
polished for the mass market. Have you looked at Make, Instructables, or any
of the other maker communities. People share their plans and designs. People
do it for fun. They also make stuff as a way of rebelling against set
institutions and consumption. (Maybe this is another strike against Chinese
culture? Overall they are used to obeying 'emperors', while our culture is
used to a near constant state of rebellion against old norms.) Making money
for the majority of this idea tribe is mostly an afterthought. This is way
different in China.

About the only thing I can think of in China's defense on this issue is that
I'm guessing more people and a larger percentage of the population have the
ability to make stuff as opposed to people over here which is probably due
more to necessity than personal preference. EDIT: One last edit, there is one
more thing that I can think of where people in China Make more due to love and
pride and not mainly for money: things related to their space program.

~~~
1stop
This comment just reads as a passive-aggressive racist rant.

Do you really think people in China do not share?

Do you really think Chinese are 'used' to obeying 'emporers'? Is that because
they did 100 years ago? Which emperor do they follow now? (if you answer is
the CCP or Xijinping, how is that different to Congress/Obama?)

Is buying a movie off iTunes for $10 more of a rebellion against institutions
than p2p-streaming it over PPS?

BYD - Innovative, non-copy cat company (A kind of chinese-mirror of Tesla).

Tencent - Non-copy cat company, crazy amount of innovation and market
penetration

So the above invalidates pretty much every point you make about 'chinese
culture' being the reason they have no maker community, because it clearly
hasn't stopped them from doing all of the things you say they don't do in
other areas.

~~~
mmorris
>> the CCP or Xijinping, how is that different to Congress/Obama?

Not disagreeing with you that their is real innovation going on in China (I
think there is), but I don't think this is a great example. The US Congress
and President Obama are all elected officials, whereas Xi Jinping and the CCP
are not.

Electing your own leaders is a pretty big deal, thus the protests in Hong
Kong.

~~~
coldtea
> _The US Congress and President Obama are all elected officials, whereas Xi
> Jinping and the CCP are not. Electing your own leaders is a pretty big deal_

You'd be surprised. Tons of Americans don't bother to even vote, and when they
do they vote for the same old shit parties, that are very much alike except
for some token issues.

------
Animats
This is about Shenzhen, not China. Shenzhen is the world center of electronics
manufacture. Those stores aren't there for people doing one-offs. They're the
supply chain for smaller manufacturers. If there's a huge stack of Blackberry-
like keyboards, that's because there's someone very nearby assembling the
finished device.

There used to be places in the US like that, focused on specific consumer
product areas. Lower Manhattan for garments, Trenton, NJ for minor tablewear,
Pittsburgh PA for heavy steel items, North Carolina for wooden furniture, and
Silicon Valley for ICs. Once the Interstate Highway System was built, and UPS
and FedEx really go their act together, there was less concentration. China's
government is trying to spread things out more, building cities in the
interior provinces, building up the expressway system, and offering companies
incentives to move. This goes against a long history of discouraging long
supply chains. For centuries, inter-provincial trade was discouraged, and
there are remnants of that today.

------
reedlaw
There is a downside to hacking-as-livelihood. Many workers are overworked.
They hack for a living, but seldom have time to hack for fun. This is
especially true among software developers. There are far fewer activities
organized around programming than in the West. Occasionally there are weekend
hackathons, but few professional programmers have the heart to participate.
They are looking to spend time with family or enjoy a few hours outdoors on
the rare weekends when they don't have to work.

~~~
potatolicious
Doing it for a living certainly does take some of the fun out of it, and
overworking in particular is both common and unhealthy.

That said, I don't think the presence of hackathons (or other such "scene"
events) should be taken as evidence of the existence of a hacking community
(or lack thereof).

Part of the point the author makes is that, unlike in the West, _hacking
/making is not a big deal_. It's not a subculture or a statement, it simply
_is_. One of the things I really despise about hackathons here is how much
time they spend wallowing in their own cultural statement. Sponsored by
Monster Energy? Check. Important investors as judges? Check. Nerf guns? Yep.
Quadcopters flying everywhere? Yeeeep. In the end it feels like 50% creating
stuff and 50% reinforcing your place in the Subculture.

In the same way the video game subculture is 50% enjoying video games, and 50%
self-referential memes about its own subculture-ness.

When I first got started in programming it was on obscure forums on the
Internet. I didn't participate in any "scene" events, I just wrote code, and
collaborated with others online who wrote code. We did it for its own sake,
not to win competitions or impress judges or hobnob with industry luminaries.
We just did.

I'd venture that most of the hacking going on in the world (in the West or the
East) is going on in backyards - both virtual and real. It's hard to gauge how
much is going on precisely because they're just hacking and making, not
preening their feathers ostentatiously and inventing capital-letter names for
their movement.

~~~
darkmighty
It's hard to argue with both socializing around and celebrating creativity.
Maybe a little less fanfare would be due, but your argument wasn't very
convincing overall.

------
imrehg
And a reply from Tom Igoe (mentioned in the original post as being opinionated
and informed):
[https://ello.co/tigoe/post/dxGk7ID3kcO0cF95U2so6w](https://ello.co/tigoe/post/dxGk7ID3kcO0cF95U2so6w)

> US makers have the luxury of being able to be makers because we outsourced
> manufacturing. And as China's manufacturing wages rise, that middle class
> has less romanticism about making things, because the skills are not two
> generations in the past, as they are for us. The kids there who wanna be
> makers most likely (based on a handful of conversations at MF Shenzen, not
> systematic) romanticize the part of a US Maker life that we now find tiring:
> the part where we hold down a high-wage job designing things to be made in
> offshore factories.

> I'm wondering if Maker culture is just genx's mid-life crisis. Instead of
> getting Porsches, we get 3D printers.

------
bobjordan
Here is a video I made a while back in a Shenzhen "cybermart" for those who
may be interested what it's like:
[http://youtu.be/C9YJBwD0geA](http://youtu.be/C9YJBwD0geA)

------
TheMagicHorsey
Great essay. Making is a movement in America, because it isn't a necessity. In
China, repairing things instead of throwing them away is the norm. So there
are large numbers of Makers in every town, who honed their skills in
electronics repair.

When robots bring down the cost of new goods to the point where it no longer
makes sense to repair things--because they are so cheap to replace--China will
lose its Makers just as America did.

And then they'll have a Maker movement.

~~~
rasz_pl
You are delusional. When robots are good enough to build everything and labour
cost of manufacturing approaches zero there will be NO ONE to buy anything. We
will end up with 1% owning robots, 9% working directly on
robots(designing/fixing), and 90% in favelas eating grass and cardboard bread.

~~~
eonwe
And robots doing what? Creating cardboard for the people in favelas to eat?

I think you're being a bit overly pessimistic here.

------
jff
> the "We here in the Maker movement could not be more pleased with ourselves"
> vibe.

Oh my, yes, it _is_ rather cringeworthy.

------
jessaustin
The cybermart description matches exactly my memory of Sim Lim Square from
when I lived in Singapore, except that place is _immense_ and you could get
the _best_ naan you've ever had in the basement.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
The best naan is to be had in Japan, where every single Indian restaurant
seems to have what looks like a stone wood fired pizza oven (and there are
many that run all you can eat naan lunch specials).

Living in Beijing, I'm so bored of cybermarts. Also, if you want to find the
makers here, try wangjing and CAFA (central academy of fine arts) rather than
Zhongguancun (where all the e-markets and grand tech universities are). It
should not be surprising that the designers and artists would be more
passionate about this than the engineer/entrepreneurs/traders trying to make
some bucks.

Also, never leave your computer with the solder guy; always insist on watching
the repair. They have swapped out good components for broken ones before.

~~~
leishulang
I brought a galaxy phone for my mum from one of those cybermarts in Guangzhou.
The original 8G ram was replaced with a 4G one. When my mum complains that the
phone run slow, I was like "you installed too much crap-apps". Then one day I
finally found out the phone was modified.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
That doesn't make sense. It was probably the flash that was replaced.

NEVER trust those people at the cybermarts...buy from the Apple store, a
certified Taobao store, or at a real storefront (though you still have to be
careful). They will cheat you if they have any opportunity to do so.

------
turbostyler
Ello is so shitty. It's like a cross between Tumblr and Twitter with a shitty
UI and almost no functionality.

~~~
goblin89
Ello is just another way to spread and consume content.

~~~
aarongolliver
OK? That doesn't stop it from being a shitty way to spread and consume
content.

------
zachrose
There's a lot of insight here, but I question whether "Maker excitement" vs.
"non-excitement of traditional crafts" should be attributed to gender. The way
I see it there are plenty of crafts like woodworking that are less "gendered"
than jewelry-making and knitting but still wouldn't gather any interest with a
Make magazine readership.

The overall point though, that electronics were in particular made obscure at
some point in the 80s or 90s, seems pretty spot on.

~~~
leoc
scottdakota in the comments on TFA mentions the guitar-electronics and
boutique-audio "scenes", both largely masculine and in the same not-hyped-but-
never-went-away category. Then there's the whole world of car customisation,
restoration and construction which also leans male, has a significant
electrical/electronic component and even enjoys quite a lot of broad popular
awareness (six seasons of national TV, dawg). I'd say the hype disparity is
more a product of class than sex, if anything. There's a certain minimum level
of cultural middle-classness which you normally have to be at or above before
you're susceptible to the urge to publish manifestos about what you had for
breakfast, and my guess is that most of the guys doing full engine rebuilds in
their spare time are below that level while many of those poking (often very
casually) at Arduinos are above it.

(Digression: another dynamic, thrusting young blogging/social networking
system without permalinks for the comments? How absolutely _darling_. To think
that WordPress, Blogger and nearly every sad, dumpy old-wave blogging system
had this one figured out back while the WTC was still standing. Strangely
appropriate given the topic of this conversation.)

------
gambiting
"Hardware hacking hasn't become a hot new thing in China because it never
stopped being a regular old thing." \- I feel like buying regular bread is
already this in many places. Where I come from (Poland) there are bakeries in
every town, you can buy regular, sour dough bread and rolls, cakes and
pastries for very very cheap. However, since I've moved to the UK I noticed
that people are so used to buying horrible foil-packed bread in supermarkets,
that all bakeries look as some kind of delis - they make "artisinal" and "hand
made" bread made with "lots of love and care" and therefore end up costing 5x
the price of the cheap toast-bread variety, and people talk about it as if
you've been buying caviare for dessert. It's regular bread, there's nothing
special about it.

I imagine it's the same with electronics in this example - it's nothing
new,it's just that America has forgotten how to do it so now it's "hip and
special".

~~~
HeyLaughingBoy
Ugh! You struck a nerve.

I make bread regularly. It's not a big deal, my mom did it, and probably her
mom before her, etc. If we're out of bread, it's not too hot to run the oven
and I feel like it, I make bread.

But then my mother-in-law comes over and can't stop raving about the bread and
if there isn't any, asking if I'm going to "make that wonderful bread" and
fawning over it to the point where I'm ready to puke. It's just bread, FFS.
Any idiot can learn to make it.

------
theophrastus
I was always impressed with this Chinese maker and farmer, Mr Wu Yulu:
[http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1265919/My-
ro...](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1265919/My-robot-
rickshaw-son-Chinese-farmer-Mr-Wu-Yulu-shows-latest-unusual-inventions.html)

------
crishoj
The headline sort of nails it: In China, doing electronics is not a movement,
but a livelihood, done out of necessity or ability rather than curiosity or
idealism.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
The first thing I learned in China: there are many different China's to
consider. There are definitely a lot of people making livings here, but there
is creative talent if you look in different places.

------
thowar2
I couldnt read this. The design of the site hurts my brain. The font is
painful and hard to read.

~~~
cmstoken
Same here. The design messes with my brain. The layout causes me health
problems. And the font is a sad song unto my soul.

------
yaiu
The font on this websight makes this totally unreadable...

~~~
psykovsky
So, you can't call it a websight at all...

------
chris_mahan
I have a few ello invites left.

Update 5:02 PST: All out, sorry.

~~~
kstrauser
I wouldn't turn one down. :-)

~~~
chris_mahan
follow my name to my website, then contact, then email, send me your email,
and I'll send an invite.

------
hikesoftware
Nice information i like your writing

------
_pmf_
Today is armchair cultural anthropology day again.

