Closest I've done is a bit of assembly, and I'm jealous sometimes that I wasn't born a decade earlier to do *myself* more of everything while it happens.
I'm not one of those people who refuse to use it because it's "not good enough". It's out of principle, skill erosion avoidance, and because I don't want to contribute to the continuation of this travesty of a situation, where a few companies have the world by the balls. Wrt AetherSDR, I can Godwin the discussion and e.g. say that "shouldn't these nice medical advances not exist?"
It was interesting days, for myself, I started out using punchcards on an IBM360, fixing a program that if there was any error anywhere, the computer would dump everything to the printer. We knew it was happening because "The printer's singing again!" as the dot matrix printer sounded different.
Can't say I miss that all that much.
The real fun started later, when I started working with personal computers. I really got into it at that point. It was an exciting digital cowboy experience.
Now the second thing you mention. The theme of a couple oligarchs controlling everything while the rest of us have nothing, based on the theme of a person's worth and principles being inversely proportional to their wealth is a common enough one, but it is a meme. I deal regularly with both wealthy and non-wealthy. Some of the wealthiest people are some of the nicest, and some of the least wealthy are some of the worst. And vice versa. There's plenty of examples of good and bad in each social-economic groups.
There are people who hate me for no other reason than I have been successful and have a certain level of money. But enough of that.
The problem with the concept of everyone but a few being destitute is this. The wealthy have to get their money from somewhere. Oligarchies fail eventually.
People without money do not buy things or pay taxes. And if the economic strategy gets tilted too far to certain groups, they revolt, or sometimes just stop participating.
And some of this might be happening in a different manner these days, perhaps unforeseen by most. Young men are opting out of the game. After many years of men being derided as the cause of all problems, and the "strong and independent woman" yet still always a victim narrative, where a male can lose his career over a false accusation, and a never-ending shaming process, a large percentage of young men have checked out. No relationships no marriage, no children. 60 some percent, no relationship, and no sexual activity. And that number is increasing
This is causing problems on several levels. Lack of children. Finding out that IVF is not some magic thing guaranteeing a nice healthy baby because the failure rate is not often discussed. Women used to doing 70 percent of the spending doesn't work out now that they have to do their spending from their salary alone. Men finding out that they can live comfortably on a third of what they needed when dealing with a wife and children.
There are more issues. I won't belabor everyone.
There is a lot of money not being spent. And really, that 60 percent of unattached males is going to be a huge problem.
Now to give my bona fides, I've worked years in the effort to get women involved in STEM careers. I'm definitely not what I'm going to be called after people read this post. I've had an ongoing interest in female/male interactions from way back. I'm a researcher by profession, and a bit of a polymath, so researchers are gonna research
Point in all this is that perhaps the pendulum has swung too far, and perhaps the revolt will simply be passive avoidance.
