Simon Griffiths

When I was about sixteen, I decided I wanted to build a VHF antenna.

The problem was that I had absolutely no idea how.

This was before PCs were common, before the internet, in the era of the ZX80 and VIC-20. If you wanted to learn something specialised, access to information was often the biggest obstacle.

I quickly exhausted the small collection of electronics and physics books in my school library, then moved on to the local public library. After that came inter-library loans: forms, waiting, and hope.

Weeks later, books would arrive that had been selected largely from their titles. Some helped. Some were almost incomprehensible to me at that age, written for experienced engineers or radio amateurs rather than curious teenagers.

Finding information was only half the battle. Understanding it was the other half.

Then the internet arrived and changed everything. Suddenly information became searchable. You no longer had to wait weeks to discover whether someone else had already solved the same problem.

But even then, there was still friction. You had to navigate jargon, conflicting advice, assumptions, and material written for experts.

What is different now is that I have an infinitely patient expert to respond to my curiosity.

As I write this on a train, I can ask an AI:

“I want to build my own VHF antenna for FM radio, can you recommend a design made with materials available from consumer hardware stores”

Seconds later I have designs, explanations, material lists, installation advice, and the ability to ask follow-up questions if I don’t understand something.

“Explain that more simply.”
“Why does that matter?”
“Assume I’m a beginner.”

The explanation adapts.

I sometimes think we normalise these transitions too quickly. The sixteen-year-old who spent weeks chasing inter-library loans would have found this incomprehensible.

And yes, I did eventually build an antenna. A simple H-shaped design that my father helped me install on the flat roof of our house.

The reception was excellent.