Miscellany: Make - technology on your time

I look back on the time spent in the various labs dotting the UF campus - the bottom of the CISE building (AKA "The Dungeon"), the NEB labs (stocked with all manner of electrical equipment), or even the chem labs at Leigh Hall (wear your goggles!) - as some of the most fun I had in college. That's why I'm probably the target audience for ""Make" magazine, a quarterly publication focusing on DIY technology and electronics.

First published in 2005, "Make" (subtitled "technology on your time") features reports on various hobbyists, scientists, engineers, and artists who create interesting projects. The meat of the magazine, though, are the DIY projects, complete with step-by-step instructions for the reader. A lot of these aren't too difficult (especially if you know anything about circuitry and soldering), and some are genuinely useful. Even if you don't do any of the projects, it's still fun to leaf through the projects to see what kind of crazy contraptions people have come up with.

Each volume of "Make" is almost 200 pages, with full-color throughout and decent quality paper. They're also kinda expensive (newsstand price is $15). I sorta wish the magazine was published monthly - it'd be much easier to justify a subscription. Still, if you've ever burned yourself with a soldering iron, you'll probably find something to like here.