Ok, you made a working cell phone. But are you sure you know how to do it? What if, next time, something goes wrong, do you have the proper diagnostic skills to figure out the problem?
He pretty much admits during the whole talk that he doesn't really know what he's doing. But he's doing it nevertheless. He's learning. And he's encouraging others to try and do stuff they don't know much about. And to celebrate small victories.
Also, I never ever have proper diagnostic skills to figure out the problem when I'm doing something I've never done before.
I'd bet the phone he made isn't going to be the last phone he makes. He'll make more. He'll learn more. Maybe he'll talk more, or write something up and then we all will know more.
Hell, after watching the video I was like "I gotta make me one of those. But with Slackware!!!" :)
Don't feel bad about a few downvotes. I just think you missed the point. (Also, I didn't downvote).
Well, he's probably nearly 4% expert by now. Presumably it depends on if the problem occurs with something within that 4% or not... ;)
Two large bits of chippery, both of which will talk (relatively) directly to a PC if needed. If it's a software problem, he'll probably be ok.
If it's an RF problem, maybe not. From what I hear, that's a nightmare.
"If it's a bug in my application I can probably fix it. If the origin of the bug is the OS kernel I might need some time. If something's wrong with hardware I'm probably screwed." Which is to say that, in some sense, the answer to the grandparent's question for a simple HTML page is quite obviously no, even for the most experienced web developer.
Except of course that this guy is probably less screwed than the typical software engineer because he (at least physically) connected the hardware components.