Hackaday Rant - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: phil from seattle
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 11, 2020, 07:28:36 pm
content: Well not really a rant but rather personal observation.I used to like Hackaday. Always showing something interesting and different. They have always had a bit of a lightweight air about them but lately they seem to be really grasping at things to promote and have become intolerant of negative opinion. Recently they promoted a giant Arduino made with painted cardboard and powered by a Nano. Deeply lame. The worst part is they deleted all the comments complaining that they have sunk low. The ones I saw were not nasty or violating their community standards. Another one featured a nearly 2 hour video about how to use embroidery hoops to suspend a microphone. Interesting idea but a) waaaay too long, b) the camera didn't properly frame the 2 girls doing it and c) the dialog was complete and utter blather (not that I watched more than a minute in total after skipping around a bit). The idea could have been communicated in 1 photo and a sentence or two. Comments pointing that out were deleted.For the record, I haven't had any comments deleted.

author: MrMobodies
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 11, 2020, 07:45:43 pm
content: This one:https://hackaday.com/2020/12/11/gigantic-working-arduino-uses-1-4-cables/Just looking at the cables and there still seems to be many but just a bit tidier that's all and I see no tracers on it.It looks like a decoration to me.

author: Bud
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 11, 2020, 07:46:33 pm
content: Quote from: phil from seattle on December 11, 2020, 07:28:36 pmYes, but the girls ... Didnt you get that?

author: floobydust
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 11, 2020, 08:38:48 pm
content: Hackaday is mainly showboating of one-man band projects, followed by the usual orphaned project- your basic dead end.There is no community input or divvied up work, just "comments"afterthe fact. It's like a TV show for projects, Kardashians included.I tried for two years to buy a Hackaday t-shirt. Got pissed off and flamed Elliot, muh how hard is it to order some t-shirts and have them in stock? Store - deleted lol.Then they started the hackaday.io "platform" to pimp out people's projects. What a mess - just try clicking on "Files" for the projects and enjoy those .pdf'sSome for sale on Tindie, some open-source, others missing content enough to reproduce the build.What is Hackaday's revenue model, how do they make profit enough to pay staff and keep the lights on?

author: phil from seattle
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 11, 2020, 09:05:41 pm
content: Quote from: Bud on December 11, 2020, 07:46:33 pmGirls, if I need that, there's lots better places. But don't tell my wife...

author: phil from seattle
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 11, 2020, 09:15:08 pm
content: Quote from: floobydust on December 11, 2020, 08:38:48 pmGood question (about revenue). They have some tie into Tindie but no other commercial connections like ads. Seems like that would be a pretty obvious approach.Yeah, their projects are, for the most part, hard to actually get details. They have no standards. It's kind of like TikTok for Tech, content free.

author: Bud
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 11, 2020, 09:37:10 pm
content: True, i have not been able to figure out how to get details for a project, all they have is a brief description and then you become lost trying to follow the links. Maybe i am not using the hackaday site correctly but then it is not obvious or straightforward.

author: RoGeorge
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 12, 2020, 02:07:33 am
content: Hackaday is aimed at makers and hobbyists community with an interest in electronics and microcontrollers. You'll see plenty of 3D printing and Arduinos, but there are some advanced or research papers, too.They have two very different places:hackaday.com - or the blog where Hackaday editors write a small brief about whatever they consider a good subjecthackaday.io - a place for comunity, where any registered user can publish own projects, or maybe just a sketch or an ideaOn the blog (hackaday.com) comments may or may not be moderated, depending on the preference of each editor, the number of links in the message, etc.In the hackaday blog, usually each article has in its first half a link to the original project, followed at the end by links to other hackaday blog/articles about similar subjects.I think the rant is more about the state of the western society in general and the makers community in special, but if you look at similar makers projects, for example at instructables.com, you'll see hackaday is quite decent on their blogged topics, and the community projects from the hackaday.io are not as simple as the projects from instructables.com.Again, Hackaday is aimed at enthusiasts, makers and hobbyists. Would be childish to get upset in the comments for why a newborn doesn't solder like a pro.However, Hackaday is always taking suggestions for what to write in their next article. If you know about an interesting project, or about a possible topic you want them to write about, please click in the blog page on "SUBMIT" and let them know athttps://hackaday.com/submit-a-tip/Disclaimer:I'm not working for Hackaday, but I posted on hackaday.io some of my projects (or some draft ideas of projects), a couple of them even landed as articles in the Hackaday.com. Was quite a surprise!

author: phil from seattle
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 12, 2020, 06:15:18 pm
content: I was specifically referring to the hackaday blog. A percentage (small, maybe 1/4) of the blog posts point to well thought out, well documented projects with substance. A similar percentage are at the other end of the spectrum - poorly thought out, undocumented "slow news day" fluff. Often it is much ado about nothing special. It seems if you can showcase a favored tech-meme it stands a better chance of being covered - anything with with Legos, for example. Substance seems to be a low priority.

author: retiredfeline
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: December 12, 2020, 11:30:36 pm
content: I don't bother with the .com site. It's more interesting to read the makers on the .io site.

author: floobydust
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 13, 2020, 02:49:18 am
content: I just see too much showboating "oh look what I made, look what I made!" and some of it is hilarious, things I made as a kid decades ago are suddenly Hollywood materialThe majority of maker stuff out there is people making content for getting attention, fame and glory - not the art...People don't share. I laughed again, e.g.sim gaming rigwith youtube vids and zero BoM, sch or dimensions etc. so it can only be a showboat for someone's project- that you can't build.3,097,749 views for part one

author: Cyberdragon
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 13, 2020, 03:50:13 am
content: EW!That thing is a disgrace to plywood...can't even be bothered to paint it.Quote from: floobydust on December 13, 2020, 02:49:18 amAnd then there's 5-Minute Crap-I mean Crafts...

author: Whales
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 13, 2020, 04:39:30 am
content: hackaday.com:Sometimes they link lots of junk, other times there is genuinely interesting stuff. I've worried about them going bad before but they always manage to oscillate back.hackaday.io:nightmare architecture, nice inhabitants. There are some really interesting projects in there but I have to fight the interface to even be able to do simple things likeread posts in order. The interface is 99% trying to hide stuff from you, as if the site has to pay for every word printed and forcing people to navigate a maze is a good thing.Just put all of the project's posts on one page, in order, not abbreviated, pretty pretty pleaseI worry that behind the scenes it's some complex framework (Wordpress with multiple users?) that will one day get deemed not worth the effort/money/time and will get abandoned, banishing all of its contents to the geocitiesverse.giant arduino:not my cup of tea, the idea tastes like Youtube thumbnails. I'm more of a function than form person.

author: TERRA Operative
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 13, 2020, 05:29:20 am
content: Hackaday is not much more than a content aggregator. They aren't making this stuff they show off (besides a couple of their own projects here and there), they are basically just linking to it with a blurb about the project.(I'm not going to touch the Hackaday.io thing here, that's just a big steaming pile of badly designed website poop).Their content quality (outside their own original articles) is almost entirely dependant on what they find around the net, and mostly on what tips people submit for them to check out.They are bankrolled by Supplyframe, and rely on advertising (which requires clicks) so they are always going to be throwing in the easy clickbaity topics. It's either that, or eventually not exist at all.So stop your whining, and either start making your own stuff to submit (I've submitted my own projects 3 or 4 times and had my stuff shown every time within the week), submit tips to the stuff you want to see, or go make your own link aggregation site with blackjack and hookers and only the coolest of hardcore projects without a single Arduino andallthe 555 timers..What makes me laugh the most though, is how those complaining the loudest about Hackaday keep going back over and over like a junkie to crack.If you don't like an article, scroll that little mouse wheel to the next one you do like. It's not philfromsealttleaday or floobydustaday or TERRAOperativeaday, everyone is going to like and dislike different things, you complain about this, they complain about that, the other person complains about something else....Why can't we all just get along?

author: Ed.Kloonk
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 13, 2020, 06:36:50 am
content: Quote from: floobydust on December 11, 2020, 08:38:48 pmSEO.The only reason I even see anything related to them is when I'm surfing around for something else and it shows up as a recommendation. Google is the financier here.edit: read TERRA's post. Yep.

author: phil from seattle
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 13, 2020, 05:34:56 pm
content: QuotePerhaps you didn't actually read what I said but rather decided to climb up on your high horse and pontificate to make sure all are able to clearly see your superiority, based on what you hoped was said.To reiterate, it was about deleting negative comments that do not violate their community standards.

author: Ed.Kloonk
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 13, 2020, 09:45:47 pm
content: Quote from: phil from seattle on December 13, 2020, 05:34:56 pmIt does in the sense that you cannot pile on the whamens for any reason whatsoever now. Maybe the community standards are out of date, but the response to this behavior is the status quo. I'm certain, however, they would have received more favorable comments if they were making sandwiches.

author: AntiProtonBoy
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: December 14, 2020, 02:33:57 am
content: I stopped following Hackaday years ago, because they had a lot of fluff like this, even back then. I'm not gonna rant on about how "they are doing the wrong thing", it's just that I realised the content is not for me, and I simply left. Perhaps you've come to the same realisation and need to do the same?

author: Fred27
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: December 14, 2020, 10:26:30 am
content: Did you find anything similar but better? I find most of Hackaday a waste of time - especially when they go through odd phases like ensuring there's the word Arduino in every single title or continually reposting from Instructables. I'd like to find a higher quality source of interesting projects but I haven't found one so I stick with the Hackaday blog page as "better than nothing".

author: TERRA Operative
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 14, 2020, 11:45:54 am
content: Quote from: phil from seattle on December 13, 2020, 05:34:56 pmThe point is you are whining to random people on he internet about a blog that owes you exactly nothing at all.If you don't like it, stop going back to it like an addict, or give them material to use that you do like instead. Sure, they probably aren't going to change their moderation habits even if you message them anyway (You did do that before bringing your complaints here right?) but they most definitely won't change if you just post your ranting here.Or keep yelling into the void, whatever makes you happy.

author: bd139
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 14, 2020, 11:49:59 am
content: It's just normal trash media these days:1. Vague wordy shit2. Wraps useless crap3. Split it into N parts to scale up revenue from sponsors4. shit show comment threadsBest thing you can do is just walk away

author: Fred27
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: December 14, 2020, 01:22:03 pm
content: Wow. Today Hackaday has reached a new low. It's bad enough that it's worth sharing. Yes - you too can now connect an LED via a switch to a battery.https://hackaday.com/2020/12/13/little-red-night-light-is-just-right/

author: Yansi
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 14, 2020, 01:25:39 pm
content: Why so much annoyed by that? Just ignore it. I just also walk away any time i see some *duino sh..stuff instead of bitchin' how bad it is. It's not even worth that much.Just let it go, today's "maker" community is anything but electrical engineers, or what once electronics hobbyists were.The only thing that really bothers me if some incompetent *duino folk presents himself as an electrical (or whatever else) engineer.

author: bd139
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 14, 2020, 01:40:22 pm
content: Quote from: Fred27 on December 14, 2020, 01:22:03 pmOh that's the Maker cult that one is.They made a shit torch, something I'd expect from an 8 year old, listed it on instructables, this was picked up by a shite aggregator and everyone's pious self-congratulationary handjobbery goes full whack.Quote from: Yansi on December 14, 2020, 01:25:39 pmThe problem is that's exactly what a lot of people do. People don't know what actual engineers do so the person doing this shit looks like a magician from the future and likes that image. Eventually some day someone asks them a question which requires more than stitching shit together with dupont cables and cutting and pasting some shit from someone else who already did the leg work. Then their universe collapses.Edit: a canonical example of this was a former boss of mine who was a software dude. He got some traffic lights and wanted to wire them up to our build server so we had a red/green status light. So he went and bought a whole load of stuff from Maplin at the time and proceeded to just bodge it up with tape and dupont wires and all sorts. This was mains powered. When he went home that night, we looked at it and found it was a basic death trap fire hazard from hell. It disappeared that night never to be seen again. A little knowledge is dangerous.

author: mikerj
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 14, 2020, 02:53:32 pm
content: Quote from: Fred27 on December 14, 2020, 01:22:03 pmThat project is surely more about the 3D printed design with ball/socket joint to aim the light rather than the circuit?

author: asmi
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 14, 2020, 04:19:21 pm
content: You guys have way too much spare time, as you apparently have time for both reading this stuff AND ranting about that. I wish I would have at least 10% of that time...

author: RoGeorge
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 14, 2020, 04:22:53 pm
content: vchaney:"I have been making things all my life, for art, for fun, and for practicality."(sourcehttps://www.instructables.com/Middle-of-the-Night-Bathroom-Light/)Hackaday reader:"This is notrealengineering, stop having fun!"

author: Yansi
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 14, 2020, 04:32:52 pm
content: Dear rogeorge, it is a big difference in making a stupid flashlight powered from two AA cells, and stuff powered from mains or other similar stuff, that can easily cause the user a harm, or property damage.So, if you like having fun, then have yourself fun, but do not sell your ideas to others, as the correctly engineered form.Just too many times I've been put in a situation, where a company needed something (cheap was likely the priority over everything else) and hired the first clueless "duino eng-uh-neer" to do the job. I was then the one cleaning the mess after, redoing all once again.

author: rdl
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 14, 2020, 04:58:00 pm
content: As several others have said, just visit the blog. Every now and then something good pops up and it's quick and easy to skim past the useless stuff. Comments are sometimes worth reading. I try to pay them a visit once a week or so.http://hackaday.com/blog/

author: SilverSolder
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 14, 2020, 05:41:56 pm
content: There are many levels of car enthusiast... from the teenager putting a chrome exhaust tip on a beat up Honda Civic, to the 60-something man that sand casts his own engine...There are many levels of electronics enthusiast too?

author: Yansi
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 14, 2020, 05:46:44 pm
content: Sure there are, but please learn where to draw the line between ahobbyistmaker and an actually engineered product.As I've said, way too often to thosehobbyistsmakers put their hand on stuff they should definitely not touch.I am fine with people doing dangerous stuff at home, but selling your *duino controller for 5 or 6 industrial drying gas fired furnaces to an industrial company, is a completely different matter. All fun ends there! *//* an actual example, what I have once stumbled upon

author: SilverSolder
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 14, 2020, 05:51:43 pm
content: Quote from: Yansi on December 14, 2020, 05:46:44 pmYou only learn from touching things you shouldn't touch. There are those who believe you should do something that scares you every day, or you are not moving forward!

author: Yansi
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 14, 2020, 05:54:13 pm
content: I am not really scared controlling gas furnaces with a proper industrial grade PLC with properly wired interlocks. But I wouldn't sleep well, using a duino board for that. Miracle none of the furnaces has blown up!

author: phil from seattle
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 14, 2020, 07:55:05 pm
content: Quote from: SilverSolder on December 14, 2020, 05:51:43 pmThat's not the issue Yansi was pointing out. The issue is clueless types pushing ideas that will get someone hurt.My favorite example of this is a clueless makerdroid pushing his Plasma Cutter Torch Height Controller. Yup, Arduino based. But that's not the real issue. Plasma cutters output a torch voltage that is proportional to the height of the metal being cut. Nominally correct voltage is 100V which is sometimes divided down by the plasma controller - sometimes not. This guy takes the plasma voltage directly into the ADC of the Arduino by jamming the wire into the socket header on the Arduino. He also uses a 100 uF electrolytic cap between the torch voltage signal and ground. He does this by jamming the cap's lead into the same socket as the torch voltage lead. So, no isolation, the torch voltage wire is not safely secured and the electrolytic cap is probably rated for 25V. I tried to explain the error of his ways but he wasn't having any of it. I also explained that he could get a much more effective and safe low pass filter with a resistor and a safer cap in the 100 nF range. No taking that one either. And he has several people building his design. One guy got it working but then it died. He's lucky he didn't die but I'm sure he will keep at it.

author: SilverSolder
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 14, 2020, 11:32:13 pm
content: People routinely do very dumb things. Including the undersigned!

author: zitt
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: December 19, 2020, 03:54:50 am
content: I entered one of their early contests with my very detailed worklog of building a complete pinball machine complete with custom designed boards.https://hackaday.io/project/674-star-trek-the-mirror-universe-pinballIf you'd rather read about it in a more traditionally website:https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/star-trek-mirror-universe-pinballAnyway; the project lost out to some really perplexing projects. I lost all respect for that "website" that day.

author: DrG
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 19, 2020, 04:14:03 am
content: Quote from: SilverSolder on December 14, 2020, 05:41:56 pmI can relate. I was a master of the $12 Thrush Muffler and any variety of muffler tape and hangar wire. Add a hacksaw (to work on that long front pipe that was rotting) and I drove cars (without getting pulled over) that had no right to burn petroleum products. Yeah, good times.Oh Hackaday, dunno seems like there are a lot of parts to that. Sometimes it is interesting. I remember a chat with that hot blonde lawyer/poker player and a guy from a computer museum and a few others that were kind of interesting. More often than not it just features a link to the real product/site, and a never-ending variety of clocks.

author: Ed.Kloonk
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 19, 2020, 04:33:00 am
content: Quote from: zitt on December 19, 2020, 03:54:50 amI ain't seen anything like it, in any amusement hall.

author: Syntax Error
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: December 19, 2020, 01:30:05 pm
content: The Hackaday website is an omnishambles. Possibly one of the worse functioning sites outside of the Amazon storefront. Certainly most projects should come with a health or safety warning. Perhaps Hackaday could add a category that reads, "x people were hospitalized by this project. Thumbs."As for the makers on there? They're not cutting edge engineers with fellowships of the IEEEEEE-whatever, they are just makers making stuff . Stuff like this...I suspect Moz powered his 'Internet in a box' using an Arduino running the blink sketch. Definately a hackaday project.

author: medical-nerd
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: January 01, 2021, 11:42:04 am
content: HiyaI check out Hackaday a few times each day - I usually find a couple of articles that are interesting, especially the retro ones.If you don't like an article just skip it. I'm sure most of us have subscribed to magazines to find editions that have no interest at all.Hackaday.io however is a nightmare.CheersSteve

author: Sonic2k
author_rank: Newbie
timestamp: November 13, 2022, 06:52:54 pm
content: I had a look at this hackaday.io site today and then I found this forum post.This is my take on the whole "makerspace" and "hackerspace" that's suddenly popped up in recent years.I think its all glam, in the same sense as reality TV.I have seen absolute rubbish get all the attention on hackaday.io. There is an argument that these people are not professionals, but there's also a fine line between someone who is a hobbyist and a professional. Beneath all of them is the makerspace. Today's hobbyists are not capable of going head to head with hobbyists that were around in the 80s when I was growing up.In the main I have found that its programmers, IT people who fancy themselves as electronics engineers that go into this space. Then you have also, these people raised on reality TV and YouTube, that go and buy an Arduino, use the examples to do things and then proclaim they're God's gift to mankind.Where were all these people when I put in all the hard graft to figure out the 8051 microcontroller without no internet resources and just a photocopy of the reference manual?All their methods are shocking... they work untidy, and I've said it before... this week past in fact. Some clever bloke thought it was OK to run a Z-80 MCU from the mains using a zener-resistor dropper.When I said that the entire system is at mains potential and a lethal shock hazard. I got banned.