Building keyboards
If you are reading this post, chances are that you do a lot of typing. I’m constantly at keyboard: typing emails, typing code, typing out a manuscript, typing on Slack, typing typing typing. I’m typing as I write this; it’s endless.
It dawned on me that if I am going to use a tool so often, such as my keyboard, I might as well love the experience. It was around this time that I discovered the world of keyboard building hobbyists. I was immediately intrigued.
I never realized that so much customization went into keyboard building: the look and feel of the keys, the layout of the board, the sounds the keys made when they were depressed. Color and sounds and feel, oh my!
After watching a bunch of videos online, I determined that I loved the sound of “creamy pops” as opposed to the thwacky sound of mechanical keyboards. For an example, watch the following video:
However, I shelved the idea to revisit at a later date. But then my wife, who is very perceptive to my constantly shifting interests, came through with a timely birthday present surprise: all the parts and materials to build the keyboard in the above video!
I was so excited to build the keyboard that I couldn’t sleep. I got out of my bed in the middle of the night, crept down the hall, threw on Monty Python and the Holy Grail in the background, and I followed Ty Cottle’s tutorial to perfection. I spent hours lubing switches, using a Dremel to shave the plate to fit the stabilizers, and assembling the board.
The result? The coolest sounding keyboard I’ve ever used. The keys popping with a soft muffled clack that scratched an itch in the back of my brain that I didn’t know I had. The slight resistance to the keys, combined with the creamy sound, made for a wonderful experience. I brought it to work so that I could maximize its utility.
But in the company of others, I was self-conscious of the sound. As my peers typed silently around me, my keyboard clacked away in a cacophony of creamy pops. One of my co-workers even wrote a poem about the keyboard!
O sweet creamy pops
How thy siren song doth clock
And brighten our days
-Karl HeilbronI also noticed some other nuisances. Because I’m a Mac user, my MacBook Pro did not have USB drives, so I needed an adapter to connect the wired keyboard to the machine. Doing this everyday was tedious.
Worst of all, I started to develop pain in my wrists. The keyboard sat too high on the table and its angle was very steep. Coupled with the pain and wrist fatigue, I couldn’t type properly. My fingers kept fumbling across the wrong keys and the convenient Mac shortcuts were missing. The keys needed much more pressure and depth to press, resulting in a sub-optimal experience. I don’t consider myself a strong typist; in fact, I’m probably below average. However, a thought kept popping into my head with every typo; missed my old keyboard. The standard wireless Mac keyboard.
I’m not impervious to sunk costs so I dug deeper, trying to persevere. I thought that maybe I just needed to get used to it. The brain is plastic! It should be able to learn these new motor movements and I’ll adjust in no time.
A few months later I shelved the custom keyboard and went back to the wireless Mac keyboard. It was so much faster, I enjoyed the tactile experience, and it worked seamlessly with the Apple products that I owned and used.
As I reflect on the experience, I am of course glad I pursed the hobby of keyboard building. It was fun and I got to learn about a whole new world of enthusiasts. But as a chronic over thinker, I needed to resolve the “why” question. Why did I try to find a new tool when the one I was using was optimal?
I have a hypothesis for this specific case: millennials have a baseline distrust for computer software/hardware. I grew up with Microsoft products that were clunky and not designed with the consumer in mind despite getting the job done most of the time. It wasn’t until I read Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson that I understood the history of Apple vs. Microsoft, the revival of Apple, and the innovation/design of its products that began appearing in my adolescence.
I realized that I had this initial resistance to products that come from big brand names, like Microsoft, and that bias extended itself to Apple. I don’t consider myself an Apple disciple, but I do enjoy their products. I now understand why I find the Mac wireless keyboard so appealing; it was obsessively designed with the consumer experience in mind.
So it’s back to the Mac wireless keyboard for me. It is quiet, sleek, low profile, portable, and quick to type with. I do miss the sound of the creamy pops though!