RETROSPECTIVE

American Machinist Publisher Bob Rosenbaum spent much of the first week of May in Taiwan attending Manufacturing Taipei, the manufacturing technology show sponsored by the Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA).

While at the show, he posted his impressions of it on the Practical

(www.practicalmachinist.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php/topic/15/625.html) and (www.practicalmachinist.com/cgi-bin/ubbcgi/ultimatebb.cgi/topic/15/629.html).

However, Rosenbaum's comments aren't the only postings at those sites.

As is typical for the Practical Machinist page, the forum's members seized on the impressions of Taiwan, launching a vigorous discussion about the differences between U.S. and Taiwanese cultures, Taiwanese machines and global business and trends.

Such topics as high-volume manufacturing-specifically, the mass manufacturing of bicycles-in China and its similarities to mass manufacturing in the U.S., the value of Taiwanese machine tools versus machine tools made in the U.S. or Japan, and the basic values built into the different cultures in the U.S., Taiwan and the rest of the world, including a discussion thread about education and unions and how pride in workmanship are instilled and carried in the workplace and through a culture, are covered over the space of a computer screen.

The discussion is stored on the Internet site under a heading about Manufacturing in America and Europe, and it's only one of the hundreds of discussion threads on the site.