Jacqueline Sweet asked David Erik Nelson:

What was the first homebrew instrument you made? And, do you ever sell the ones you've made?

David Erik Nelson My first homebrew instrument was Tim Escobedo's "synthstick": http://www.davideriknelson.com/sbsb/2... —which is a great project, although some of the materials (certain types of cassette tape and Mylar wrapping paper), which were just the most common back-of-the-closet junk in the world when I first stumbled across his design, are getting increasingly scarce. Still, it's a really great synth circuit to start out with, and I continue to use the same basic core design in lots of projects.

As for selling instruments, I don't, but folks are always offering to buy them (esp. the electric guitars), and I can never really fathom why they'd want to do that. It reminds me of this story I once heard about Jobs and Wozniak. This is back in their blue boxes and garage-tinkering days. Early on, when they were developing that first Apple computer, they got into an argument over whether or not there was a market for a computer, as a finished consumer product. Woz was of the mind that the fun was in building it--that a computer, at most, should be a kit--and Job was of the mind that the fun was in using it, that you should open the box and power up and immediately have easy access to doing something cool. Evidenced by the fact that I'm writing this on an Applie bluetooth keyboard mated to an Apple iPad while listening to music on an Apple phone and running Disk Utility on an Apple laptop, I guess we know who was right. But still, I'm a Woz kinda guy. I don't want to sell guitars and synths that are all just like the guitars and synths I'd build; I want folks to build their own guitars and synths, and then show me what they did and why it's better for them.

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