> I'd be careful bashing the hippie bee movement.

Aren't all beekeepers, by definition, much closer to "hippie" than any other
label?

I started this thread, and took care to include this:
"Jim (Who was Demeter Certified long before it was cool, or even spelled
properly by most folks)"

But if they are to "bashed" at all, it is merely for their lack of rigor in
their approach to simply unknowingly re-creating the 1970s that they have
not researched with far cheaper and better technology at their beck and
call.   If they actually came up with any new ideas, I might be less blasé.
Look at this for an example:

http://opensourcebeehives.net

They laid out a cutting pattern for a KTBH and a Warre hive that can be cut
from PLYWOOD on a laser cutter.  They wanted to have one built for our use
here in NYC so that there would be a unit in operation for the media to see,
and when asked how the plywood, stained, painted, whatever, would stand up
to the elements, the leader of the project confessed to having no idea.  If
you look at the design, you will notice multiple cases where the end-grain
of the plywood faces up, exposed to the elements.

Oh yeah, and at some point, they want to add instrumentation, using Arduino
modules because even the hardware has to be Lego-like, Lord forbid anyone
should solder up some circuitry or use existing proven tech like low-power
data-loggers.  (That faint sound you hear is Jerry Bromenshenk, laughing his
head off, and you can hear him all the way from Montana, over the waving
fields of dental floss.)

Today's kids can simply mail-order a Sunforce 45455 Wind Generator 30' Tower
Kit" from Amazon, and expect it to be delivered in a week, paid for by a
Kickstarter where they convince others that they already have the skills
that they are about to learn that they don't via "the hard way".

http://www.amazon.com/Sunforce-45455-Wind-Generator-Tower/dp/B000C210KU
http://tinyurl.com/kzudtf5

I had to do finite element analysis for days using an HP-45 programmable
calculator to work out my first tower for a wind generator, as it was faster
and easier than doing it in FORTRAN on anything, from a PDP-11/70 up to any
of the CDC Cyber line of (at the time) supercomputers.  (Visicalc would not
appear until 1978, creating the current collapse of the planet's economy by
giving MBAs a tool with which they could play "what if", and rationalize
that a factory was worth more when sold off than when making stuff).

In sum, I'd say we are being pretty gentle in our humor, and forgiving in
our analysis.

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