RE: Building vs Assembling [kits vs arf]
I'm just getting back into R/C after having been away from it since the early 90s. I'm not a very good pilot and I actually enjoy scratchbuilding more than flying. The rewards I get are about 65/35 in that respect. I've been kind of preoccupied lately by the massive trend in ARFs and, believe it or not, I've also thought about the use of the word building in referrence to putting an ARF together. On one hand it annoys me a bit since joining pre-covered wing halves is not the same as building a wing. I don't think anyone would argue with that. But, my real concern is that the hobby is shifting (neutral word) from one of craftsmanship, engineering, problem solving and creativity to one of thumb agility. Even the popularity of electrics suggests to me that the time, patience (as you point out) and passion for tinkering and modifying IC engines is giving way to the cleanliness of EP.
One theory I have is that we are in the midst of a generation or two that do everything with a mouse, keyboard and game controller. I've worked for two universities for the past 12 yrs. and it's abolutely true that many of todays young people were simply never exposed to the types of hands-on toys and hobbies that people born before 1980 grew up with. It makes sense, then, that when they develop an interest in R/C, the transmitter is the most familiar and exciting aspect of the hobby. Add to that that many newer R/Cers have probably logged more hours on a PC flight simulator than at the field and the propensity for instant gratification and the popularity of ARFs seems natural.
It may be true that these days the skills and character traits that I value so much - and gained from modeling - are simply not necessary in today's job world, so why learn them. But, I still believe that one is missing a great deal of enjoyment and personal reward by never having sliced a finger open with a razor blade.