I used to love soldering back in the day of hobbyist electronics. Assembling something, while learning about it and then using it, was extremely satisfying. That era has been lost to the complex engineering of touch screens and smartphones–but computer enthusiast Albert Gajšak wants to bring back hobbyist enthusiasm by releasing a DIY phone kit. It's called the MAKERphone and it's pretty damn cool.

For Gajšak, the process of building your own phone isn't about nostalgia. Rather, it's that we need to be empowered as users and creators, rather than passive consumers. He and his team want to give people the ability to create a smart-enough phone without all the time-sucking needless features, while learning about how the world around us works in the process.