There is most certainly a hardware fabrication divide. When we speak of a digital divide we usually mean lack of access to computers to make more software. (ex. HTML, jpg, CSS, mp3, mov, avi, etc.) What about access to hardware, software, and materials to make more hardware devices? This is a question Neil Gershenfeld, the director of MIT’s Center for Bits and Atoms Fab Lab, asked at the O’Reilly E-Tech (Emerging Technology) Conference. Go download and listen to his amazing speech from IT Conversations describing how they took labs consisting of gear to fabricate “Just about anything†to teens in urban Boston, Costa Rica, Ghana, and Pakistan. What does this have to do with Audio Activism? Imagine the ability not only to make your own media but the resources to MAKE WHAT EVER ELECTRONIC DEVICE YOU WANT? (well just about any) I’d make an audio recording device that would upload the audio file to the web immediately or somehow share it locally…fast. Gershenfeld has a book out called FAB: The Coming Revolution on Your Desktop–From Personal Computers to Personal Fabrication that I plan to get soon.
Although it’s easier and easier to build special-purpose physical devices (e.g., you can build a custom PCI card for PCs easily and cheaply nowdays), I think the point is that general-purpose processors make hardware projects fairly pointless these days. Anything you can do in hardware, you can do on a programmable platform these days.
Something I failed to make clear in my post… the fabrication equipment that was described by Gershenfeld can make all kinds of stuff. Not just electronic devices w/ PC boards and microchips. Check out the stuff the kids in Ghana made. Your point is interesting Stephen. Could you share some links to elaborate?