:PROPERTIES:
:ID:       4f1399fe-56d3-4d8c-9c8c-6992c7add58f
:CREATED:[2023-02-10 Fri 12:55]
:END:
#+title: Technology to Craft

We tend to think of newer technological innovations as... technologies, things that require a great deal of expertise and capital. What /is/ a technology, however, is not constant. As we generally acquire more knowledge and expertise and accumulate more capital, what was once a technology gradually becomes an craft. Instead of expertise, we tend to associate crafts with skill, and the capital might still be considerable, but is definitely within the means of an affluent person, or even a determinant one. Paper, printing, candles, soap were all technologies a few centuries ago. Chairs and pottery and agriculture were technologies a few millenia ago. Fire and cooking were the bleeding edge tech before that. Today, unless you are in an episode of survival reality shows or student housing, fire-making and cooking to keep yourself fed are not even crafts anymore, but merely ordinary skills.

Once-technologies from a century ago are now gradually becoming crafts that are easier to master and difficult to control. firearms (and soon bullets), secure communication, and financial safe havens. Instead of trying to stop them, we need to figure out what to do in a world where everyone with some skill can have an armory and an off-shore bank at home.