Many other things could be manufactured "on such tiny scales, to such high precision", but they wouldn't be useful. Integrated circuits are one of a few produc

Many other things could be manufactured "on such tiny scales, to such high precision", but they wouldn't be useful. Integrated circuits are one of a few product/technology classes for which miniaturization is unconditionally good (improved power consumption, lower unit cost, possibly higher speed) up to unavoidable physical limits (e.g. randomly arranged doping atoms, noise vulnerability). Integrated circuits are also very easy to interface with the "real world" despite miniaturization because of their electronic nature: a comfortable range of currents and voltages is tolerable for the integrated circuit and acceptable for the larger system.