[Discuss] Economics Re: Free Hardware

Nancy Ouyang nancy.ouyang at gmail.com
Fri Apr 17 00:06:21 UTC 2015


Back on topic -- thought this recent news was interesting, segway was
bought out by a Chinese "clone" company

http://thestack.com/chinese-ninebot-us-rival-segway-150415

Xiaomi-backed startup Ninebot, a Chinese maker of electric-powered personal
>> transportation products, has acquired U.S. rival Segway [...]
>
>
>> The U.S. International Trade Commission agreed last November to look into
>> the Segway complaint which sought to block imports of Chinese Ninebots into
>> the U.S. With the new deal between the two rivals it is unclear how the
>> investigation will unfold. [...]
>
>
>> Segways currently cost up to £6,200 in the UK, compared with Ninebot’s
>> relatively cheap alternative priced between £700 and £2,500.
>
>
>>
~~~
narwhaledu.com, educational robots <http://gfycat.com/ExcitableLeanAkitainu>
 [[<(._.)>]] my personal blog <http://www.orangenarwhals.com>,
orangenarwhals
Researcher, Postmodern Robotics Group, MIT Electronics Research Society

On Thu, Apr 16, 2015 at 8:05 PM, Nancy Ouyang <nancy.ouyang at gmail.com>
wrote:

> I started watching TED talks many years ago, and recently more and more
> people are developing hives to "TED". I'm not sure why... maybe it's too
> popular now. Sure, many of the criticisms you direct at TED are valid. But
> for me, I like TED, because it's often "ideas worth sharing", often
> straight from actual scientists but presented in a way that's meaningful to
> folks outside it, and furthermore the TED website put a ton of effort into
> transcribing and translating the transcriptions and link the transcriptions
> to video times.
>
> If I'm searching for something I watched a while ago, the transcribing is
> invaluable, and if I want to share with my Chinese parents, the translation
> is invaluable. Not to mention it's actually accessible to my deaf friends.
> No community-funded hackerspace has the centralized resources to transcribe
> and translate all their videos like that.
>
> So there are benefits to "corporate culture" and "TED" that we shouldn't
> reject outright.
>
> "nothing in life is black-and-white" as it were, just varying shades of
> grey...
>
>
> ~~~
> narwhaledu.com, educational robots
> <http://gfycat.com/ExcitableLeanAkitainu> [[<(._.)>]] my personal blog
> <http://www.orangenarwhals.com>, orangenarwhals
> Researcher, Postmodern Robotics Group, MIT Electronics Research Society
>
> On Tue, Mar 31, 2015 at 4:35 AM, Timofonic <timofonic at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Hello.
>>
>>
>> What's so cool with The Church of Entertainment, Technology and Design?
>> It's mostly a popularity contest by a marketing organization, I don't see
>> it follows a true counterculture movement such as Hackers from Berkeley's
>> Homebrew Computer Club and MIT, Open Hardware & Software and Free
>> Knowledge. It's "just" a bunch of charismatic people that try to convince
>> their ideas are worth it. Some people call it a lobby, others a sect.
>>
>> Sorry for the rant, but it's not a valuable source for me. It's the same
>> as Elon Musk Stephen Hawking (they want to be relevant in public opinion,
>> despite they are pr stunts these days) vs Ufologists (ancient aliens!
>> Flying saucers! Reptilians and other bullshit), both have no idea about the
>> matter.
>>
>> I think Open Hardware and Software organizations must learn to make their
>> projects alive and prosper without losing essence, not convert their ideas
>> into abstract economics that finally end dominated by oligopolies. If you
>> are just a economist, you fail to see the whole picture, you must be a
>> scientist too.
>>
>> Let's make things reality, not selling ideas before making them real.
>>
>> What about worldwide promoting and supporting hackerspaces that promote
>> making projects and teach science to people of all ages? There are lots of
>> passionated people that wants to learn, but they have learning difficulties
>> and very little money to spend on it.
>>
>> Free Knowledge must be leaded by the people and for the people, not just
>> cool people with white smiles and nice haircuts like in a corporate
>> conference.
>>
>> Regards.
>> --
>> Sent from my Android device with K-9 Mail. Please excuse my brevity.
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>>
>>
>
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