Democratizing the Maker Movement

Posted by samzenpus on Wednesday September 9, 2015 @06:00AM from the leveling-the-playing-field dept.

aarondubrow writes: To its advocates and participants, the Maker Movement resonates with those characteristics that we believe makes America great: independence and ingenuity, creativity and resourcefulness. But as impressive as today's tools are, they're not accessible to many Americans simply because of their cost and high technological barrier to entry. An article in the Huffington Post describes efforts supported by the National Science Foundation and other federal agencies to create new tools, technologies and approaches to make the Maker movement more inclusive and democratic.

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Re:Okay by Dr.+Bombay · 2015-09-09 07:48 · Score: 5, Interesting

The term "maker" used to cause me to cringe as well, until I saw a plaque on a Pratt & Whitney gun boring lathe from the 1860's at the Harper's Ferry museum.
The plaque read,
Pratt & Whitney
Makers
Hartford, Connecticut
If one of the earliest precision machinery manufactures thought of themselves as makers, maybe the term is not so bad after all.