Eedu is an easy-to-use drone kit for young Makers

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Assemble. Code. Fly. It’s as simple as that.

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According to Mary Meeker’s 2015 “State of the Internet” presentation, drone shipments are estimated to hit 4.3 million units this year, with consumer drone usage expected to jump 167%. Combine those figures with the hundreds of thousands of Makers looking to begin tinkering with their next DIY project, and well, you have yourself quite the market. Much like a number of educational robotic kits that have been introduced to provide children with basic electronics and programming principles over the years, one Las Vegas startup is looking to take that education from the ground and into the skies.

Inspired by the hands-on learning that goes on inside classrooms, Skyworks Aerial Systems has launched Eedu — an easy-to-use drone set that allows young Makers, educators and hobbyists starting out to devise new applications, other than just flying cameras. In order to make this a reality, the team has developed an intuitive platform that gives Makers the canvas they need to design their own UAV. The airborne apparatuses can be quickly pieced together using nothing more than its included parts, and are completely compatible with Arduino shields and other open hardware (littleBits and Seeed Studio).

Once assembled, the drone can be paired with its special robotic development environment (RDE) called Forge. This cloud-based, community-driven software lets users code their vision into a reality, while offering ground control, community interaction and various programming capabilities. What’s nice is that, being open source, Makers can build from existing codes. As soon as an app is completed and compiled onto their Eedu, the DIY copter is ready for the skies.

The drone itself is based on an Intel Edison, which enables programs to be easily created on a full Linux OS and boast enough processing power to develop more advanced apps, and employs an ARM Cortex-M4 running on RTOS for sensor processing, main flight control and to interface with the Edison. Eedu also comes with a set of four brushless motors with standard trapezoidal drive, each powered by megaAVR MCUs. What’s more, the machine features a sensor mounting platform, an Arduino shield port and a quick release battery pack. Crafted with safety in mind, the propellers are extremely lightweight and comprised of soft plastic alongside intelligent speed controllers that automatically disable the rotors whenever something gets in the way.

Beyond that, the team has unveiled a highly-advanced, adaptable flight controller driven by an Atmel | SMART Cortex-M7 MCU. Equipped with all of the electronics required for a drone to take to the sky, LUCI includes four built-in 20Amp brushless speed controllers, an Intel Edison expansion port, a DSMX compatible radio receiver, an optical flow position sensor, GPS and Arduino shield capability. Impressively, she can even be integrated on a number of consumer 250mm sized drones, giving Makers the ability to produce their own LUCI and Forge-powered UAV.

With hopes of granting future Makers and engineers access to the necessary tools for innovation, the team has given its crowdfunding backers the option to purchase a kit for students or entire classrooms.

“More than ever, schools are having a hard time acquiring technology. We passionately believe that students’ accessibility to technology should not be hindered! As such, we are creating a donation fund that will allow us to distribute drones to schools across the nation.”

Intrigued? Fly on over to Eedu’s Kickstarter page, where Skyworks Aerial Systems is currently seeking $100,000. Delivery is expected to begin in December 2015.

Students create a rubber band-flinging drone with AVR

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When shooting a single rubber band just won’t do, its time to build a UAV to do it for you!

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For those who may not know, PennApps is the granddaddy of college hackathons converging over 1,200 hobbyists and tinkerers from all over the globe onto the campus of University of Pennsylvania. Students work in teams of up to four people for thirty-six hours to create a web, mobile, wearable or hardware project, and show if off at the final expo, which is open to the public.

A Carnegie Mellon University team — going by the name “Bodyguard” — comprised of Makers Kumail Jaffer, Angel Zhou, Kyle Guske and John Lore recently decided to create a rubber band-flinging drone for their PennApps project last fall. In order to do so, the team affixed an Arduino Yún (ATmega32U4) to a servo motor that would power the rubber band cannon. To do this, they connected the Arduino to the drone’s own Wi-Fi network and relayed signals to shoot.

You can watch it in action below!

Hack the world: How the Maker Movement is impacting innovation

In March 2011, an earthquake and following tsunami rocked Japan, culminating in the worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl. While the government focused on stabilizing the situation, the people of Japan were terrified of radiation, unaware whether it was safe for their families to stay in their homes.

(Source: Sean Bonner)

A group of Makers out of Tokyo Hackerspace found a quick solution to lack of information by building a cheap and easy-to-use pocket radiation detector using an Arduino (a pint-size computer that’s relatively easy for anyone to program). They began making them, and most importantly, sharing the instructions online for anyone to reproduce. Through a partnership with Safecast, they were able to get the radiation data off of people’s phones and onto an online platform. Within a month, thousands of data points had been picked up, and people could determine whether they should evacuate. Even today, people all over the world are building these radiation detectors, iterating on the original design for new purposes. Fikra Space, a hacker group in Baghdad, has amended the design to track Depleted Uranium pollution in their region.

I use this anecdote as an example frequently as a glimpse into the power of the Maker Movement. A term that’s been widely popularized by technologists as of late, Makers are not necessarily persons with huge engineering prowess. Neither are they hackers with malicious intent. Instead, the term Maker defines a movement combining simple technology with the right culture of innovation and collaboration, to have impact at a scale that most startup founders, corporate innovators, and city legislatures only dream of.

What is a Maker?

Makers represent a subculture of tinkerers, artists, and engineers. It’s a culture that is akin to punks and Goths – it represents not just a style, but a lifestyle. It has crossed decades and countries effortlessly. It is an ethos: a fundamental belief that the world is made better by building, and taking things apart.

(Source: Kyle Cothern)

Makers thrive on several things:

1. Finding novel applications of existing technology

They are interested in breaking or hacking things to make them better, more efficient, or just more fun. ArcAttack is a band of musicians using massive Tesla Coils, alongside live and robotic musicians to create a spectacular show of musical prowess and technological innovation. Anouk Wipprecht, fashion designer and former Autodesk Artists in Residence created a Faraday Cage dress for this past Maker Faire in San Mateo, and people watched in awe as she performed alongside ArcAttack as bolts of lightning struck her on all sides without doing any harm.

2. Exploring the intersections between seemingly separate domains

Because the barrier-to-entry to be a Maker is so low (read: nonexistent), new domains of expertise and collaborations are the process on which they thrive. 3D printers, once an expensive technology allowed for the elite few companies that required them and those who knew how to operate them, is now at a price point and skill level that many can afford. Similarly, this technology is being used for everything from printing clothing to live organs and skin. The opportunities are endless.

3. Curiosity and voracious appetite for continued education and Do-It-Yourself

Why buy something when you can build it? Why not learn how to solder? (Think of the possibilities!) These are the fundamental questions that drive Makers. From craftsmanship to electronics, Makers build things that are inherently valuable to them at that moment, whether it’s building a smart coffee maker to building a table. The pride that you feel from learning a musical instrument or a new language is the high that drives Makers to learn more, and do more.

Community (Makerspaces, Hackerspaces, FabLabs, Oh My!)

(Source: Mitch Altman)

Makers rarely work alone. Instead, they interact with an ever growing global community of hackerspaces, makerspaces, fablabs, and other collaborative spaces to share ideas and resources. Makerspaces have cropped up all over the world to give people access to tools, education and collaboration normally reserved for universities and corporate environments. These membership-based organizations range in size and structure, but share common tools such as 3D printers, CNC machines, electronics components, and more. These gyms for your brain have grown from several hundred to over 2,000 globally in a few short years.

(Source: MakerBot)

Makers in collaboration can lead to some advantageous financial results. In 2008, Bre Pettis, Adam Mayer and Zach Smith schemed up a small, inexpensive and easy-to-use 3D printer within New York’s hackerspace, NYC Resistor. Later that year, they released their first version for consumers. 6 years later, MakerBot has sold over 44,000 printers, built a leading brand, and was recently acquired by Stratasys for $403M. A company born out of the Maker Movement, MakerBot has ushered in a new industrial revolution, characterized by collaboration and open-source culture. They’re not alone in this endeavor, companies like Adafruit Industries, Arduino, and countless others are blurring the line between play and profit.

The Art of Playfulness (or, How to Fail Often)

When communities are built on resource-sharing and experimentation, there is considerably less stigma around failing. You simply try again, plus some well-earned knowledge and battle (soldering) scars, along with the thousands of others within the community.

The Power Racing Series understands all too well the educational benefits of failure and have embraced it with a friendly competition. Power Racing Series was schemed up at Chicago Hackerspace Pumping Station: One by Maker and designer Jim Burke. The challenge: build a working electric vehicle, starting with a kids Power Wheels and $500. Race it against a dozen others at Maker Faires all over the country, and compete for both technical prowess and “moxie” points awarded by the crowd for the most creative and ridiculous teams. Chassis’ fly off, cars catch on fire, and general, hilarious mayhem ensues.

(Source: Anne Peterson)

This race has gained tremendous traction as a friendly competition between makerspaces all over the globe , as a learning tool for engineering and imagination. Makers have competed from i3 Detroit, NIMBY, and even MIT. While the teams are competing against one another, they also share knowledge, tools and tech between one another during the race. Currently the races are held at 7 Maker Faires in the US, and they are opening up a high school league to encourage use of the races as a STEM education platform for students.

Companies like Power Racing Series have grown organically from embracing the inherent silliness that is a result of constant, quick-fire iteration. They also understand that it offers a unique hands-on way to learn engineering sans classroom or textbooks. Similarly, littleBits has found a way to teach the basics of electrical engineering with magnetic Lego-like blocks that can produce anything from musical instruments to internet of things devices with a few snaps. Sugru has made an entire business out of fixing broken things with a fun new material with the texture of Play-Dough that fixes everything from soldering irons to motorcycle windshields.

Impact (Produce Locally, Share Globally)

Makers think big. They don’t think in terms of revenue or projected growth, they think in terms of impact. Unburdened by fear of failure or lack of resources, they make things because they are useful, or present a unique challenge. Because of this, and ingrained roots stemming from the open-source software movement, the technology created has the ability to be adapted and used all over the world, outside the bounds of traditional gatekeepers.

(Source: Eric Hersman)

Makerspaces have permeated every corner of the globe, from Nairobi to Nicaragua, allowing access to shared resources not just within their individual spaces, but across borders. Just as Bre Pettis and team sought to solve the problem of expensive 3D printers, Makers are building things that are equally useful to them, and their communities.

BioCurious, a community of biohackers (yes, that’s a thing) in the Bay Area has found a way to make real vegan cheese by engineering yeast, raising over $37k on Indiegogo to fund the project. Two years prior, 4 girls in Lagos debuted a urine-powered generator at Maker Faire Africa, which provides 6 hours of electricity for every Liter of urine. While both projects are prototypes, both are reactions to clear, yet strikingly different needs of the individuals and communities involved.

Arduino, the pint-sized computer from Italy, is a tool for making an open-source micro-controller board and development environment that was inexpensive, cross-platform, and easy-to-use. Founder Massimo Banzi has succeeded in this endeavor, as Arduino boards have become the micro-controller of choice for Makers, and are used to power a variety of devices, from the previously mentioned bGeigie Nano to a variety of internet-of-things devices. The fact that Arduino is open-source allows anyone to iterate on the boards, whether creating smaller versions for wearables, or printing your own on paper.

DIY Drones, a website started by former Wired Editor-in-Chief Chris Anderson, sought a way to bring UAVS (Unmanned Arial Vehicles) from military to hobbyists. In a few years he’s been able to bring together an impressive community of Makers building drones and drone parts for a variety of purposes. Matternet has taken this movement and applied it to a very specific problem: the 1 billion people in the world that do not have access to all-season roads. This means, even though many of them have advanced telecommunications infrastructure, they cannot get food of medicine during an emergency. Founder Andreas Ratopolous saw the potential in UAVs far beyond what was being explored by hobbyist and has turned it into a viable business with massive impact.

What’s Next for the Maker Movement?

The Maker Movement has garnered a lot of attention over the last 5 years, but it’s not without it’s flaws. Hackerspaces and makerspaces, though great places to learn and innovate are difficult to scale, and can come with a host of organizational and cultural problems. Though there are a whole host of success stories of profitable business by Makers, most of the innovation is still culturally insulated and doesn’t ever make it to a business. Large brands have been attempting to leverage the Maker community to encourage internal innovation, but with little success. Why? By being exactly what the Maker moment loathes: large, secretive, and profit-driven.

The Maker Movement needs bridges, people who are passionate about everything that is at the core of the culture who are able to connect Makers to each other, and to the resources to translate ideas into tangible products.

As humans, we’re made to make stuff. It’s a fundamental part of our survival. The Maker Movement has built a culture on that core belief, and the creativity that it has unleashed has massive potential for the future of innovation across all domains, turning anyone from an engineer to a large organization into an entity capable of astronomical innovative potential.

Written by Madelynn Martiniere, this article was previously published on October 27, 2014 on Medium. 

1:1 interview with Mitch Altman, Co-Founder of Noisebridge, San Francisco (Part 2)

…Continued from Interview with Mitch Altman (Part 1)…

Tom Vu: What is the Hackerspace in Residence Program? Why is this important?

Mitch Altman: Let me start by giving some background…

Over the past decade, thousands of designers, engineers, artists, programmers, crafters, scientists, cooks, musicians, tinkerers, and the otherwise curious, have gathered at hackerspaces (sometimes also called makerspaces) to explore and do what they love — often finding subjects and projects they find meaning in pursuing. This happens because of the supportive community, as well as the tools and other resources found at these unique spaces found all over the globe. People work and play individually and collaboratively. People come from varied and diverse backgrounds, with varied and diverse skills. This mix of people, skills, community, and tools creates synergistic magic.

Each hackerspace is unique, each with their own set of focuses. Yet they all share in this magic. Through the sharing of skills, information, and other resources within community, we can design the worlds we want. The steps in getting there are often challenging. In fact, this is why we need these collaborative spaces, where people of different backgrounds and diverse skills cooperate and help each other.

Researchers are now starting to study the hackerspace movement, asking what these spaces look like, in what ways their practices changes across these sites, what values connect them, in what ways they differ from each other, and how they connect with and influence and help the wider world.

Along these lines, somewhat related programs such as after-school and out-of-school programs, as well as home schooling and unschooling, have been growing steadily in recent years. Students and instructors are still searching for high-interest content combined with hands-on creating that keys into areas of interest without the rigidity and sterility of most current classroom structures. In essence, it’s really about creating and playing and trying things. It is about hands-on, experiential, play-based science, art and learning. We can break things. We can take things apart. We can fool around. We can put things together again in our own ways. This is useful regardless of the topics of interest. This facilitates tinkering and making things, but also helps in learning science, math, and other more conceptual or abstract fields of study.

Hackers In Residence Program Kickoff event at Tsinghua University | Photo Credit: Mitch Altman

We are approaching 2,000 hackerspaces on the planet, and growing fast. Again: each space is unique, each perfect for the people who started it and the people who keep it going. Yet, each space is part of the international hackerspace movement. And, to varying degrees, hackerspaces all help each other.

To facilitate this process of growth and mutual benefit amongst hackerspaces — helping each other and the world — I am putting a lot of energy into the Hackers in Residence Program. For a long time now there have been Artist in Residence programs to support individuals in their art. Artists benefit greatly from this. And since the visiting artists have shared their skills, their knowledge, and their enthusiasms and passions for their art, the hosting communities benefit as well. People in a hosting community can pick up on these priceless gifts and cruise with them in their own ways. The artists also take their experiences and what they learn with them when they leave, further sharing wherever they go.

This Hackers in Residence Program is similar to an artist in residence program, only broader in scope. Not only art, in its many and varied forms, but anything can be shared and supported when someone is a hacker in residence. Not only the visiting hacker and the hosting community benefit, but all hosting organizations (hackerspaces, libraries, museums, art organizations, corporations) — and the world — benefits, since the hacker moves on from their visit, taking their new experiences and/or projects along with them to share, cross-pollinating wherever they go. And the joy spreads.

I have been both an artist in residence and a hacker in residence. These were fantastic experiences for me! They helped me create new projects. I was able to teach people what I love. I shared my enthusiasm. And I was able to take what I learned from the unique spaces and communities that hosted me, and I’ve shared these experiences with other spaces wherever I travel.

Teaching people what I do — at home, and as I travel around the world — my intent is to encourage people to explore and do what they love. On the surface, I teach people the simple skill of soldering, with which anyone, any age, any skill level, can make cool things with electronics. I also teach electronics and microcontrollers (using AVR microcontrollers, since they are so easy to learn and teach, especially with all the cool free and open source tools available for all operating systems — and with the zillions of projects available online). I give talks on many subjects, with the intent of helping and inspiring others to explore and do what they may find meaning in doing.

Many organizations — such as hackerspaces, libraries, museums, art organizations, corporations — can offer people residency opportunities where they can share their skills, work on their projects, explore their subject, learn from others, with mutual benefits and contributions in so many ways.

Early next year we will launch the HackerInResidence.org website, a totally free website where any organization can list themselves, and create pages for Residency opportunities. It will also allow anyone in the world to easily search for Residency opportunities that they can apply for. (We can use another volunteer web-programmer — if you’re interested, please contact me! Mitch AT CornfieldElectronics DOT com)

For example, I have been an advocate in helping solidify Tsinghua University’s Hackers in Residence program. Tsinghua is considered one of the most prestigious universities in China. Their president is wanting education at Tsinghua to be all about learning to live a life each student loves living. Creating a hackerspace at the university is an experiment in education towards this end. By inviting creative hackers from all over the world, including China, to become residents, working on projects, sharing their skills and knowledge and interests and passions, leading events, such as hackathons and exhibitions — by doing these things, and whatever else the resident is moved to do, students will be exposed to a world of diverse creativity, learning in ways people learn at hackerspaces (and, unfortunately, not at most schools), learning in ways that have been proven to work, ways that lead and inspire a lifetime of learning, creativity, and innovation.

Hackers In Residence Program Kickoff event at Tsinghua University | Photo Credit: Mitch Altman

I have become involved in helping some of the budding hackerspaces in China such as Beijing Makerspace, Chaihuo Hackerspace in Shenzhen, and Xinchejian Hackerspace in Shanghai. Some interesting projects have grown out of these hackerspaces that make people a living — and, as with all projects created out of the shear love of doing it, these projects are good for the others in the local community, in this case, local Chinese culture.

Chaihuo Hackerspace in Shenzhen, China

What if there were a lot more opportunities for people to take advantage of? This could be really good for the individual hackers, the individual students, people in the outlying community, and perhaps, if there are enough opportunities, for all of China. And if it works in China — and all indications show that it probably will — it can work everywhere, as they have at hackerspaces around the world over the last several years.

But we are just at the beginning now.

Hackerspaces are a global phenomena and changing the very fabric of how we can learn, share, interact, and create. Hackerspaces.org (which I helped form at its inception in 2008) is a good informational and networking nexus site that helps people starting and running hackerspaces around the world. This site allowed the early creation and spread of what is now the hackerspace movement.

Since then, the hackerspace movement has grown exponentially, providing opportunities for lots of people! But, we need more. To benefit the world’s 7 billion people, we need a million unique hackerspaces planet wide. I think that the Hackers in Residence program, with its HackerInResidence.org website, can help a lot.

Kung Fu Hacking at Hackers In Residence Program Kickoff event at Tsinghua University | Photo Credit: Mitch Altman

TV: Tell me more about how you started this Hacker in Residence program?

MA: For the past few years I’ve organized an annual Hacker Trip to China, where a bunch of hackers (note to reader, this implies the earlier stated original sentiment of a “hacker”: people who use any available resource to make their projects cooler, and share the results) from around the world to go to China to (amongst other cool things) help transform some portion of education there. After several years, all this organizing is paying off! At the end of last year’s China trip, Tsinghua University officially started a Hackers in Residence Program. The program is still nascent, but there will soon be a constant stream of diverse hackers from around the world staying at Tsinghua to mentor students!

Hackers In Residence Program Kickoff event at Tsinghua University | Photo Credit: Mitch Altman

The culmination of our trip last year was the Hackers in Residence Kickoff event at Tsinghua University. The event was mongo! Including a mongo LED display showing a hacked version of the “Kung Fu Fighting” music video. All of our talks were on top of a huge crane. It was lots of fun. And celebratory. And lots of education bigwigs were there. The Hackers in Residence is now an official, for-credit, ongoing program at Tsinghua. We’re expecting this to continue on, and grow, and eventually spread all over China, and hopefully everywhere. It’s pretty exciting.

Maker Carnival | Photo Credit: Mitch Altman

We also visited Shanghai for Maker Carnival, my manufacturer in Shanghai, XinCheJian hackerspace in Shanghai, HAXLR8R accelerator program in Shenzhen (where I’m a mentor), Chaihuo hackerspace in Shenzhen, and many other cool events and places. In this first half of the year, I have been busying organizing Hackers In Residence Program abroad.  Since my return from last year’s Hacker Trip to China I have been busy furthering the Hackers in Residence Program there, and everywhere. I’ll be leaving with this year’s Hacker Trip to China at the beginning of November, bringing another great group of diverse worldwide hackers who are wanting to share what they can, and learn from all of our experiences, and bring it all back to share at home. Our first stop will be Tsinghua University.

Hackerspaces in China | Photo Credit: Mitch Altman

TV: What does the Hacker In Residence Program provide to the learning participant?

MA: It can be different at different organizations, depending on what the organization has to offer, and what they require of the Resident. At Tsinghua, they want to provide their students a constant stream of diverse hackers from hackerspaces around the world, overlapping with other Residents staying there. As well as providing travel expenses, food, an apartment, access to way awesome tools, and space to work on their own projects, each Resident collaborates with students to come up with their own cool projects that they will show off at the end of the semester. They also make themselves available as mentors for the students. Most importantly, it’s all about the Residents and the students having an amazing experience of a lifetime.

The last point is very important. These hackers in residence can perform peer-to-peer interaction, providing encouragement and inspiration, as well as help with skills and knowledge. They can help guide students’ ideas, help bolster a student’s curiosity and interest, supplemented with pathways drawn from the student’s own hands on experience.

Since Tsinghua University is so well respected in China, the program will probably be spreading to universities and schools all over China. And hopefully, spreading throughout the world.

The Hackers in Residence program is needed. It is needed because education today is too far behind the curve, focusing on standardized tests rather than learning what a given person wants and needs to the life they want to live. It is needed because it will be so cool to have Residency opportunities for people everywhere to take advantage of, and to share of themselves, and help the hosting organizations and communities. Everybody wins.

Hackerspace in Residence Program| Photo Credit: Mitch Altman

The Hackers in Residence program offers people a chance at real, live, actual learning opportunities (at universities, schools, hackerspaces, libraries, corporations, museums, art spaces and all of the places it will exist).  The resident will collaborate with students to choose projects they will work on in small groups. In turn, they will also be available as a mentor for students and help assist in local hack-a-thons. Most importantly, it’s all about having an amazing time and doing work in cool projects that can be shared so new opportunities and potential residents in the future can gain from these interactions just as well.

Kung Fu Hacking Tsingchua Style with Hacker in Residence Program

TV: How does this dove tail into something larger? Such as in priming for the next industrial movement or even development of applications around the Wearable Tech, Internet of Things, or 3D Printing? Perhaps reinforcing the Maker Movement?

MA: The way I see it: community is very scarce at the moment in our modern world — and it is very much needed. At the same time, people are often too afraid to be creative. Yet, we need to express our creativity to thrive in our lives. The era of good little workers for factories and massive industry is past — the pendulum is swinging toward a new paradigm of meaningful and sustainable innovation. The old production paradigm does not make for a healthy human spirit; it does not provide a world full of people feeling their lives are way worthwhile. We can help transform workers and vocational and professional training to encourage people to take more vital roles in contributing to fulfillment in their lives — this is what can lead to a well-balanced global ecosystem, fueling innovation, creativity, opportunity, and community. With more people having the opportunity to experience community that supports our creativity, all areas of human endeavor can be enhanced.

TV: Does “hacking” need to be part of DNA for the inception of great Product Ideas?

MA: Need? No. Desirable? Yes.

Many of the products available for purchase today are things we don’t necessarily want or need — they were created primarily to maximize profit. Of course, we need money to buy food, shelter, and many other necessities. We also need some money to buy resources we want so that we can live lives we find way worthwhile. But how much money do we need? The concept of enough is an important one to consider. The howling engines of Marketing manipulate us through our hopes and desires and fears with the goal of maximizing profit — we’re needed to buy things to feed this engine. Sadly, the choice to maximize profit is often chosen over making our lives and our world better. Sadly, some of us choose to maximize profits even when it is known that the consequences are likely to make the world a less safe or less good place… Does it really need to be this way?

Hackerspaces along with its core methodology helps foster things that people really love. Participants become passionate around their creations. This creates a higher chance that these ideas, woven with much imagination and passion, are good for those that create them, as well as for the surrounding community. If you create something you love, chances are that others will love it, too. And when people love what you do, they may even pay you to do it. If it is a product or service that others love, these may actually be helpful and relevant in their lives. If this is the case, then the world is actually becoming a better place. This is the result of more people working and playing with what they love, what they find meaning in doing. That, rather than maximizing profit, can be the primary factor in why we do what we do. The net result is that more people feel they are living lives that are way worthwhile. This is the way I see things.

Let me talk a bit about China again. One of the big economic games there now involves Western corporations manufacture their goods there. For a while now, it has been more profitable to take advantage of the differing economies, despite the costs to ship the products half way around the planet after production. This game is changing, however, for three reasons. First, the Chinese economy is improving, causing labor costs to go up (as they should). Secondly, the exchange rates for Chinese to Western currencies are going in the wrong direction to be advantageous to the West. And thirdly, shipping costs are continuing to go up. Sometime soon, it will be cheaper to manufacture elsewhere in the world. And China needs to adapt so that Chinese people are directing their creativity and innovation towards goods and services that are good for China.

If culture in China can change so that even a significant minority of people explore and do what they love doing, then chances are they are coming up with goods and services that are good for the local community in their part of China. This leads to vibrant local economy that works for their part of China. If enough people make enough money to live lives they want to live, this is good for China. Which means that it is good for one seventh of the world’s population. So this would be good for the world. And I can’t help but add that hackerspaces are great places for people to explore and do what they love — places that can help encourage peoples’ creativity and innovation.

This same process can also work in other parts of the world.

I have friends involved in setting up hackerspaces in Egypt where they help organize communities and witness people there making a living with small projects. The economy is such that not much money is needed to do a lot there. People create, grow, and sustain themselves and others in this way.

Things are somewhat similar in Detroit, which has been economically depressed for quite some time. There are many resources left behind from its heyday as an industrial center, including inexpensive space, and cheap materials, making it a wonderful place for creation. Creative people have been moving to Detroit to take advantage of this. There are a few hackerspaces there where people come together and support each other in making all sorts of way cool projects, some of which make a living for many people.

Let’s create more opportunities for people everywhere to be part of supportive community where people can create.

Regional Hackerspaces provide opportunity to create and help local innovation in the culture

TV: What is hacking? Can we make this a positive orientation for our youth and innovation?

MA: The origin term for “hacking” has been warped by the mainstream media. Historically, the term was coined by the model railroaders at MIT in the early 1950s. They used all sorts of things as resources to make awesome model railroads — it didn’t matter what those resources were originally intended for. They made awesome model railroads. They saw what worked, and what didn’t work so well, and they shared it with each other, and with other model railroaders. This is the ethos of hacking that we still use today at hackerspaces. It is a way of life — do what you love, make it more awesome with whatever resources are available, and share it!

When computers started to become available, the model railroaders at MIT made use of them. Over time hacking become more about computers. But it was never limited to only computers.

In the 1980s, as computers were just beginning to become more of a household item, the mainstream media used the word to describe a small number of people who used their computer skills to do some questionable or outright illegal activities, often doing things merely for profit or power. Let’s not pay too much attention to that definition.

At hackespaces, people are doing things and making stuff because they really love it. The world is full of resources. We can make use of anything in the world as resources for our projects, to make our projects cooler. We can see what works well and what doesn’t work so well, and we can share the results. This is hacking. And anything can be hacked: electronics, art, food, science, craft, ourselves, our communities, society, the planet! Everything can be improved. Hacking in this way makes our lives better. It makes the world better. We can all benefit from the hacking ethos and mindset. People of all ages, youth on up. Innovation is an obvious result.

Hacker in Residence Program Panel hosted by Patrick Schmidt

TV: Hack? Does this personify someone who is learning and growing? Sharing? Building?

MA: Yes! Next question. Really. These are elements of what the hackerspace movement is bringing forth. To be ideal and optimistic, we can potentially expand this hackerspace notion. More and more hackerspaces can potentially usher us into another Renaissance era similar to artist and painters sharing and meeting together back in that age. With my previously stated 1 million hackerspaces spread all over the globe, a huge number of people can simply walk to the closest one, like the parks we have today in some communities. All of us can push toward the positive and come together in our own domain, each playing our part.

If we are wanting to learn, then we will. What transpires in our lives is the result of the choices we make. We make choices, big and small. We have no control over the consequences of our choices. But we can learn from them. And then make new choices. If we choose to, we can make choices on what we believe will make our lives (and those around us) a little bit better, a little bit cooler. Then, it seems to me, there is good chance our lives (and the lives of those around us) will get better over time. And if enough of us are doing this, the world gets better. This is hacking. Hacking ourselves. Worth a try? If you think so, then why wait — make a new cool choice today! And if you’d like some support, visit a hackerspace.

TV: How do people from different walks of life engage with Embedded designs?

MA: Phones and microwave ovens, cars, thermostats — all these devices and more use microcontrollers. They are all embedded devices. I think it is important to have at least some understanding of the devices we use all the time in our day-to-day lives. This is one reason why I teach how to make cool things with microcontrollers. Anyone can learn the basics. It isn’t really hard. I have led workshops teaching people ages 10 on up how to play with microcontrollers. They are simply small computers. They have electronic parts connected to their pins. They run a computer program running that controls those parts to do something cool. That’s all there is to it!

There are people all over the world teaching this stuff. It’s fun.

The more hackerspaces there are, the more people can learn this, and other things they want to learn.

TV: How about people who don’t live near a hackerspace?

MA: Start one! This is the way all hackerspaces happen.

But, there is also the internet. It’s not a substitute for actual community, but it is a great resource. The internet provides us with so much information and choice at our fingertips. The UN now considers access to the internet a basic human right. A while back, more opportunities were available to those who had access to universities. It is the case now that people with internet access have more opportunities than people without. Just about anything you want to learn is available to some extent (probably quite a lot!) on the internet.

And if you can become part of (or create) a supportive community for learning (such as a hackerspace), then it is even more powerful. Anything is possible. The hackerspace movement itself is one result. The huge DIY 3D printer industry is another.

TV: Does this mean that technology is a signature of who we are? Tech adds definition to what we build together?

MA: Technology is an outgrowth of who we are, sure. It can add to who we are. It can also get in the way. It is up to each of us what we choose to do, what technology we create, what technology we make use of, and how we make use of it. These choices, along with the other choices in our lives, define who we are. And since technology is such a powerful force in our lives, the choices we make regarding technology has a very large effect on who we are.

TV: Where would you like to see the hackerspace movement lead?

MA: I would love to see more people living lives they feel are way worthwhile. My definition of success: living a life doing what you love, and in so doing what you love, make enough of what you need to keep doing what you love! What if you lived that life? What if a huge number of people in your neighborhood lived that life? What if a significant number of the 7 billion people on the planet lived that life?

Perhaps hackerspaces can lead towards that ideal. I think it’s worth going for.

TV: Why are AVR chips so pervasively used as the microcontrollers of choice in many hackerspaces?

MA: They are an easy-to-learn microcontroller. They have really good datasheets compared to many others — they are actually readable! Because of this they are easy to teach with. AVR chips are used in the super-popular Arduino platform (and Arduino clones), which make it even easier to learn and to teach microcontrollers. Atmel was very smart to support free and open source development tools for the AVR chips. There is a large online community of people helping and supporting each other. There are hundreds of thousands of projects online, many free and open source, that make use of these chips.

I’m seeing these chips used in numerous crowdfunded embedded projects, including solutions for wearables and connected devices. Because Arduino (with AVR chips) makes microcontrollers so accessible, developing microcontroller projects is open to lots of people who wouldn’t otherwise have made use of them. Even very complex projects are possible, such as 3D Printers. The early ones started by using Arduinos (with AVR microcontrollers).

I’m comfortable using lots of different microcontrollers. But I really like using AVR microcontrollers since they are so easy to learn and to teach with. I lead frequent workshops teaching how anyone can make cool things with embedded microcontrollers. These workshops can range from making a simple kit to learning the ins and outs of how embedded devices work. Certainly, Arduino makes it less intimidating, yet super powerful.

For beginners and the highly advanced, the AVR framework and devices are very accommodating. Atmel has done well in doing their part for the community, promoting free and open source dev tools. There are packages for Windows, Mac OS X, and tools for Linux, all using the C++ compiler, and GNU Compiler tool chains (GCC). (Me and my friend Jeff Keyzer created an easy-to-follow cookbook approach for anyone to follow for installing the AVR toolchain on Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux.) Again, this was a really good choice on Atmel’s part. Because of this, people in the early days of the Maker Movement adopted Atmel chips over others. Because of this, the Arduino people chose to use Atmel chips. Arduino boards are available all over the place (online, and even at Fry’s and Radio Shack), and there are probably hundreds of people making Arduino clones, with at least a hundred thousand projects available to download for free online. All of this is part of what helped the Maker Movement as we see it today.

AVR chips have been used even in emergency response disasters such as Japan for the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster. Many DIY/Maker radiation Giegier counters were quickly put together. SafeCast is an international hackerspace project that helped people collect data across the region.

TV: How do hackerspaces relate to crowdsource funding?

MA: Hackerspaces make things inexpensive and accessible. When we pool our resources, we can do a lot with very little. At hackerspaces we can create things that people love. But if we want to turn our project into a product, and make a lot of them so that others can benefit from it, we may need some money for manufacturing it, or otherwise put it out into the world.

Until recently, it used to be that people would seek funding from banks or from Venture Capitalists. This is changing now with the advent and success of crowdsource funding. Now anyone with internet access can fund projects via Kickstarter, IndieGoGo, and other crowdsource funding sites. And this can be done almost anywhere in the world.

You don’t need to give your project (or fledgling company) away to your funding sources! With crowdsource funding, you enlist the help of lots of people who invest in you and your project because they are truly enthusiastic about it! If it your funding campaign succeeds, you know that you have something that people want, that there is a market for what you have to offer.

Right now, we can see on many crowdsource funding sites, projects for home automation, gardening, water quality, energy production, and many other imaginable and unimaginable things. There are so many things are being explored and most of all, this is just the beginning. People are really exploring now. It is way too early now to see how this plays out. Some ideas and products will eventually become fads. On the other hand, some will likely take off and cause a disruption to how we’re used to doing things.

 

TV: Another option is to join a hardware accelerator.

MA: Yes. There are a several hardware accelerators starting now, helping to build out not only phone apps, but actual physical hardware products.

There’s Highway 1 here in San Francisco. I am a mentor at HAXLR8R, in Shenzhen, China. These are both places where someone with a cool hardware idea can go from having a proof-of-concept prototype to having a manufactured product, ready to sell, in as quickly as 3 months. It’s kind of amazing. This was unheard of even a few years ago.

At these hardware accelerators, financial support is available, typically about $50,000, in exchange for a few percent of equity in the startup company. The funding is packaged with mentors and training, and connections to contract manufacturers in China, where people can choose to manufacture their product.

I like making myself available as a mentor to those who are making hardware projects that they really love. I am a mentor at Noisebridge (a non-profit Hackerspace in San Francisco that I co-founded) and at HAXLR8R in Shenzhen, China. There are others, too. They all have a bunch of people really focused on creating the projects of their dreams, and turning them into products for others.

For the 3-month program at HAXLR8R, everyone starts out living in Shenzhen, where every day everyone is surrounded by the other groups working on their projects, supporting each other. Experts in their field are there to help, with mentors available to help as needed. There is also access to lots of great fab tools, such as laser cutters, CNC mills, 3D printers, pick & place machines, and other equipment for making high quality prototypes. The program ends with a Demo Day in San Francisco, where people show off their projects to media and potential funders (though many choose to use crowdsource funding only).

There have been several projects that have turned into successful products as a result of these hardware accelerators.

It is now possible for entrepreneurs to do a lot with very little. My TV-B-Gone universal remote control project, for instance (a keychain that turns off TVs in public places), cost only $2,000 in development costs to create the first prototype.

People with cool projects can raise enough money in a crowdsource funding campaign to complete hardware prototypes and do an initial run of manufacturing. Kickstarter has really taken off! Kickstarter has the advantage of being one of the biggest and most popular platform. Since its inception in 2009, the crowdfunding platform has raised more than $1.14 billion for 63,056 successfully funded projects. Pretty amazing.

On average, about 43 percent of campaigns are successful. Some of these get courted by Venture Capitalists, but after their successes, they do not need to give up much of their company. One of the famous popular successes was Pebble. Another is Oculus Rift, which raised $2.4 million in 2012 on Kickstarter for its virtual reality goggles. It went on to be acquired by Facebook for $2 billion. Crazy! Clearly, Kickstarter gave Oculus Rift the visibility it needed. But even for smaller scale projects, crowdsource funding can be a very good indicator of the market and demand for a product.

TV: Are hackerspaces important for enterprise?

MA: They can be. Lots of cool projects have been created at hackerspaces, which later went on to become products launched by startup companies. Lots of 3D printer companies, for example, have grown from hackerspaces.

People at corporations, large and small, have started using hackerspaces’ websites and IRC channels, as well as peoples’ github, to find people to hire. They also recruit for hack-a-thons, which are also used for recruiting for hiring. There has even been many field trips to Noisebridge from well-known companies. Companies are also trying to learn from what works at hackerspaces, and wanting to re-create the creativity-spawning process that hackerspaces promote, and add that to their corporate culture. Some have even added hackerspaces in their companies. Ford, for instance, has a hackerspace. This allows everyone at Ford, even people who don’t normally design cars, to come together and play, sometimes coming up with ideas that are later incorporated into Ford’s cars’ designs.

Companies can benefit if their employees have opportunities toward growth and education. This can happen at hackerspace, and it can happen at companies, too. If companies become places where employees actually want to be, that helps the employees, and can only benefit the company. It’s great to have people in all sorts of realms creatively converged on a mission. They are very much missions with open ended curiosity, energy, and ingenuity.

I’ll add that many schools, universities, museums, and libraries are also starting to incorporate hackerspaces into their missions, making it a part of their cultures. (And if they also incorporate a Hacker in Residency program, even more will benefit.)

TV: What does the future of embedded and hacker spaces have for the culture of tech.

MA: The future is entangled and threaded into the fabric of the choices we make — including what we choose to do with our time, and what we choose to make. In so many ways, that’s who we really are: how we use our creativity, what we make and what we do. People have always made tools in our attempts to make our lives better. Everything we make is Tech. Culture is Tech. Tech is Culture. Culture defines Innovation. Culture sets the context for how things we make are used. Hackerspaces, incubators, accelerators, startups are some examples of early adopters of this transfusion in making more of culture blend with technology and art. I hope we can make the results positive for more people to live fulfilling lives. I’ll be doing what I can towards this end.

TV: Last question, well really not a question… Please consider us friends. 🙂

MA: Off course, let’s go out and do more cool stuff!

 

Haven’t checked out the first portion of this interview? You can find it here.

Hackerspaces: A prelude to the Maker Movement and today’s Maker culture

So, what exactly is the Maker Movement? Do you remember that ever so distant yet memorable quote by Michelangelo? “Every block of stone has a statue inside it and it is the task of the sculptor to discover it.” 

Now, to further set this, [white fuzz] the channel just switched, we are tuned. Things will change right? They have changed. We have the Internet; we will have one layer more, eventually the arrow of technology will continue. There is one congruent dataset, which manifests all things to a new exponent. It’s the pulses and signals resulting from the exterior world meshed with the existing datasets of infrastructure, enterprise, and the consumer. Let’s speak of this layer. It will be filled with sensors, microcontrollers, and code. Already, we learned this from the app revolution and we are not going to remain in just this stage right? The code will be leaner and smarter. Coupled by the signal readings from millions of device upon device, node to nodes, nodes to node, the true power of distribution and networks will again marry now with other application recorded data in a mosaic of diversified integrations resulting from the intersection of data easily bridged from the cloud apps. Yes, the ones we are already familiar today touching from screen to screen to anticipate the next arriving notification.

The arrival of this integration of data will help filter and augment the world before us. Let’s reset to the modern era, thread modern computing to this notion, [for technology’s sake] we have also seen the Gartner quote by Jim Tully stating, “By 2018, 50% of the Internet of Things solutions will be provided by startups which are less than 3 years old”.

The Digital Renaissance and the Maker Movement

Together with the accessibility and progress of open source and availability of community and embedded development boards [specifically wider use of Arduino Maker class boards], the times have certainly changed. A great deal of the complexities of these development boards are relaxed with onboard abstraction layers to loosen the programmatic rigidness of “hardware,” combined with the collective tuning of the community toward its development software.

Arduino IDE is now quite anchored into well-received feedback/contribution loops supported by the open source model — crowdsource progress and joint development roadmaps. Let’s not forget all the risky and obviously passionate Makers out there doing and bringing ideas to the forefront. The timing is right — found in the appetite to feed the market, the maturing cloud, the developed community, parity in prototyping, and the global production.

Globalization of Hackerspaces and the Maker Movement | Photo Credit: Mitch Altman

As a whole, and to its sum of its parts, all community members are participants in the evolution of the ecosystem and community effort of “Making” with ease. At all aspects of the innovation engine cycle, the open source community couples quite well with hackerspaces, where one can congregate to surface ideas and mature them to fruition.

Open Source Community and Hackerspaces | Photo Credit: Mitch Altman

This is especially true where it applies to the mere process of creating a product. In fact, it’s now true to building things that 10 years ago you needed to be in a big company to make innovating things, but now it truly possible from an individual. Made possible to said horizon, there are the hackerspaces. It’s a place that shows signs of innovation and development, infusing wider spread of technology and community across all economic classes or cultures. In these facilities, these are technical and creative social clubs facilitating activities that include tinkering, machine tooling, 3-D printing, coding, open source, collaboration, and sharing. Some hackerspaces market themselves under the more benign-sounding label of “maker space”. More bluntly, this is really drawing attention as private incubators such as hardware accelerators fueling entrepreneurship and startups [an emulation of an innovation success formula taken from the original hackerspaces.

There is something about hackerspaces that brings people together that are made of some pretty awesome stuff. Call it “Voltron” if you will, why not? With drones rising and Maker Faires (or similar) blooming all around us, it all seems like the perfect unison of having people interlock together. As the notion of building robots continued to unwind, one fellow by the name of Chris Anderson saw that it would be much easier to have robots fly first than walk bipedal. More simply, it just felt and saw it to be much easier. Perhaps, something even more achievable and widespread adopted as the next step to bring about the age of drones.

But still, wait, there’s even more to how this started. We also owe the spawning of drones to a unique origin where a group of people, hive together pursuing one ultimate quest.

Call it social science and synergy if you will. Something happens when a group gets “too large” and suddenly it all transforms from a conversation into a cacophony and a team into a mob then something incorporated too soon begins may wield the ugly cues of politics. Yet, going it alone is usually impossible if the task at hand is at all sometimes complicated [maybe the next best thing for technology]. Assembling IKEA furniture is probably best done as an individual, but things like raising a family, having a stand-up meeting, or shipping a meaningful product is definitely a team sport…

For hackerspaces, one of these unique values is in having opportunities to meet different people from all sorts of backgrounds. Combined in a common pursuit of sharing and making, there is a common thread of being willing to be giving their time and talents to others. Note, it was in what’s said as “giving” as the common notion in hackerspaces are the more you give, the more you get back, helping to change the course of things to come [individual pairing of ideas to the intellectual hackerspace benefit of networking ingenuity]. It’s all about the community. This is the hallmark of the Internet. The Internet started as a community in its deeper past with ARPANET. We are all reaping those originally rooted benefits today [first operational packet switching networks implementing TCP/IP] creating layer upon layer new industries, service models, and ecosystems (ie Apps, Cloud, M2M, IoT, etc). Now what we are seeing today sprout from city to city are hackerspaces. In fact, we may begin to see every community in a city drawing upon good reason to incubate and nest new hackerspaces. Perhaps, it’s a progenitor to something more in the next trend of innovation.

The digital life now is a result of the collision of software and hardware. Technology is fashion. Fashion is Technology. Both are now intertwined together in the speed and making of culture. Have you ever tried leaving your home without the mobile touch screen device or everyone has out grown to wearing the old flip analog/cdma phones of the past. Digital influence upon culture and self move along prevalently—the desire for hackerspaces are becoming more acquainted in many metropolitans.

There’s a secret sauce to the structure of the hackerspaces. Unravel this structure. From within, it reveals a true community based packed with peer-to-peer involvements. People with skills converge in distinct trades upon others with other skills. Combined, they make this union, transforming their once ideate policy of making, broadening their abilities coupled by a giving and sharing of others to expand the design envelope of possibilities.

Surely, one may see it as a digital and hardware renaissance, comparatively from the distant spark of the past. The foundries of artistry in Florence and Rome once prevailed, urging communities of artist to congregate and make creative expression toward emulating realism via sculpture, oil and canvas. Well, now it’s about achieving a more meaningful product. The canvas has changed, coalescing digital and hardware. Giving rise to an idea where the ideas mature into a minimal valuable product that is mapped to some form of developed connectivity. This some form of developed connectivity is what we call the Internet of Things or many of the products sprouting from emergent crowdfunding rooted by makerspaces or hackerspaces.

A common construct. Make Ideas, Make Genuis, and Make Things | Photo Credit: Mitch Altman

Now, let us imagine a place where people get together without a common construct or preconceived established code, they then converse, and collaborate. It is filled to the brim with entrepreneurs and inventors of all types working on projects that they hope will change the world or at least convinced to usher an adoption to things making what we usually do more easier or enhanced.

Many of them are on laptops or standalone computers frantically typing business plans or hacking out code; others are making phone calls while trying to set up connections wherever they can.

Hackerspaces have an environmental core that keep ideas flowing | Photo Credit: Mitch Altman

As all the chaos goes about, one can see that in this space is an environmental core that keeps the magic flowing around innovation. It is the center foundation of what the area will turn into. While the outer linings are being fine-tuned and polished, the inner workings remain relatively unchanged. The concrete has been laid; the electrical wires have been strung throughout the wooden frames and the insulation and drywall is mostly there, all while a wireless network is hangs throughout the air. Projects can begin even if the air conditioning isn’t hooked up yet.

As long as there is a good foundation, people can get stuff done. The rest of the work on the outer edges will always be changing. Paint will cover the walls in different shades and dust will always need to be cleaned up. However as time goes on and unless a major change happens, all the people running the space will need to do is adjust the dials of the environment (when needed) and continue progressing the community. Once the foundation is done first, the rest will fall into place.

Next up, read the 1:1 interview with Mitch Altman, co-founder of Noisebridge San Francisco as we dive deeper into hackerspaces, the Maker Movement and more…

 

 

1:1 interview with Mitch Altman, Co-Founder of Noisebridge, San Francisco (Part 1)

In this feature of Bits & Pieces, I interview one of the original forefathers of hackerspaces. Mitch is one of the original co-founders of the infamous spaces named Noisebridge in San Francisco — which later became a exemplary model for others around the world. Mitch exemplifies the persona of a hardware hacker, who not only knows a great deal about embedded programming, but has even built powerful remotes capable of turning off every TV his general vicinity.

Mitch Altman at Hackerspace Noisebridge

Crafty and creative beyond belief, he has made a name for himself through a series of innovations, like the Brain Machine, one of MAKE Magazine’s most popular DIY projects. Mitch has been leading workshops around the world, teaching people to turn “innovative” ideas into “cool” things with microcontrollers.

Aside from his revolutionary projects, one of his greatest contributions to the Maker Movement is the co-founding of Noisebridge. This is one of the original and renowned hackerspaces located in the Bay Area, which has also been voted best hacker hangout and best open source playpen, even with roots in Hackerspace Shanghai, Spacebridge.

Mitch Altman at TedX Brussels

Noisebridge members have been involved with a number of major award-winning research projects, receiving accolades from top-tier academic conferences such as Usenix Security Conference and CRYTPO.

So, who are some of the names that have been in this place and aspired to some stem of their development and design pathway to Noisebridge? Puzzlebox’s Steve Castellotti and ootsidebox’s Jean Noel are among many others who have fused ideas and shared roots at the hackerspace.

Mitch Altman and the Brain Machine

TV: Tell me about the uniqueness found in hackerspaces.

MA: Yes, in a constantly changing world of technology, there is always the demand for a place where one can go to learn. Develop hands-on experience with technology. Energize raw intent and unique thinking by doing. Members of hackerspaces can learn by simply being ones own self — unlocking creative opportunities to exercise ideas, just like we do today in gyms to run with the common thread in a desire to be fit and conform to health. Here, we all want to make something. Make a difference and answer the appetite for creativity and ingenuity.

5MoF: Five minutes of Fame Guest Speaker at Noisebridge in San Francisco | Photo Credit: Mitch Altman

Imagine an open space, a dominion where people get together, hang out, converse, and collaborate. It is filled with anxious or latent inventors and entrepreneurs of all types working on projects that they hope will change the world or even change their state of how they want technology to evolve. Many of them are on laptop or using 3D printers eagerly typing business plans, performing logical aerobic, collaborative acrobats with peers, or simply hacking out code. While others, simply chat on the best route to a problem, share their expertise, make assumptions and some decisions based on a number of others feedback. Like some of the chaos in quantum physics, within all multi directional movement and buzzing about, there is a collision of “out of the box” thinking and production. To speak of it’s core, one can see a reaction happening in this space [hackerspace] with a unique setting — compounded by human interaction that keeps the magic flowing with innovation.

Noisebridge Class-a-Thon | Photo Credit: Mitch Altman

It is the center foundation of what the area will turn into. While the outer linings are being fine-tuned and polished, the inner workings remain relatively unchanged. The concrete has been laid; the electrical wires have been strung throughout the wooden frames and the insulation and drywall is mostly there, all while a wireless network is hangs throughout the air. Projects can begin even if the air conditioning isn’t hooked up yet.

Noisebridge Class-a-Thon | Photo Credit: Mitch Altman

As long as there is a good foundation, people can get stuff done. The rest of the work on the outer edges will always be changing. Paint will cover the walls in different shades and dust will always need to be cleaned up. However as time goes on and unless a major change happens, all the people running the space will need to do is adjust the dials of the environment (when needed) and continue progressing the community. Once the foundation is done first, the rest will fall into place after that. What’s said is the gem of hackerspaces.

Noisebridge Class-a-Thon | Photo Credit: Mitch Altman

TV: What is your vision of education and hackerspace fusion into the working sector?

Tim Berners-Lee once said, “A hacker to me is someone creative who does wonderful things.” This is the true and original meaning of a hacker. Though, that’s changed over time with all the compromises in security and loosely used terminology of “hacker.” Education has gotten far worse in the past many years; right now we are seeing people pull this in the positive direction. More and more bureaucracies are turning up in all areas of education. Education should and could be something to parallel the goals to what we are living to strive toward, fulfill more worthy lives. In the current system, I think it doesn’t have to be that way. With so much progress in the Internet and access to information, we can learn to live the way we really want, conduct it more differently to sustain our lives. Our upbringing has a lot of influence around this idea. As for education, I had a few really good teachers that saved my life. When I was a lot younger, I remember being brutally abused in education settings, while some teachers stood by. Reflecting, it really was horrible. Most importantly, a very special teacher really took me under the wing and got me interested in all sorts of geeky things. It was quite timely and in this intervention, things set pace for something entirely different moving forward. This newfound interest got me through the day. It uncoiled hidden or latent talents, which were shielded by other complicated things of the emotion and growing up. It opened up possibilities for interest. It is in this deeper individual passion of what I loved that served as the fuel for what’s to come. By the time I got to the university, I eventually found things and embarked on a common thread — engaged in the true value of education. I found the searchlight.

5MoF: Five minutes of Fame guest speaker at Noisebridge in San Francisco with Ken Haggerty | Photo Credit: Mitch Altman

I really had access to this inner drive. While so many teachers do want to do good, it’s in the unintended bureaucracies that force stagnation or cloud the true arrow of education. Instead, many educational settings are forced into things where teachers are molded to increase standardized test scores for funding, etc.

We now know from many disadvantaged kids in these poor neighborhoods where education and know-how is certainly the best thing they are looking forward to in exiting their current situation. We arrived on this abundant planet, and there are infinite possibilities but then they are narrowed down to working at Burger King.

I love to see and help create more opportunities. Today, there are 7 billion on the planet. There are 1,500 hackerspaces, which are helping nourish and mature the creative thoughts to opportunities. We need more of these intellectual YMCAs where technology and creativity [access to development boards, broadband connectivity, open source code, 3D printers, etc.] can be the setting to help aspire and cultivate passion.

5MoF: Five minutes of Fame guest speaker at Noisebridge in San Francisco with Ken Haggerty | Photo Credit: Mitch Altman

But still, there are not enough hackerspaces… In fact when crunching the numbers, in an ideal provision, we would need somewhere between 1 million hackerspaces. Give workshops and motivate forces of people in supportive environments and communities, advocate and nurture the exploration to do what they love and learn.

5MoF: Five minutes of Fame guest speaker at Noisebridge in San Francisco | Photo Credit: Mitch Altman

The love and learning go hand in hand. People come to hackerspaces and commit lots of time here because they not only love teaching but love what they do in sharing and building… The stem to these roots are not rested on people standing in rolls and columns responding to bells or authorities at the front giving orders and instruction. Instead, the pendulum of learning is more weighted on sharing [more of the availability of hardware, resources and motivation] on learning what they want to learn and share what they want to do its through play, experience, the innate drive to go for it!

5MoF: Five minutes of Fame guest speaker at Noisebridge in San Francisco with Lee Felsenstein | Photo Credit: Mitch Altman

TV: What sort of workbench or set of dimensions of aptitude do hackerspaces bring forth to an individual?

MA: To describe them simply, hackerspaces are community centers with tools. Hackerspaces combine manufacturing equipment (e.g. 3D printers, CNC, etc.), community, and education for the purposes of enabling community members to design, prototype and create manufactured works from end to end that wouldn’t be possible to create with the resources available to individuals working alone. These spaces can take the form of loosely-organized individuals sharing space and tools, for-profit companies, non-profit corporations, organizations affiliated with or hosted within schools, universities or libraries, and more. All are united by a common thread and interest in the purpose of providing access to equipment, community, and education, and all are unique in exactly how they are arranged to fit the purposes of the community they serve.

Noisebridge in San Francisco | Photo Credit: Mitch Altman

Hackerspaces represent the democratization of ideas, sharing, giving, design, engineering, fabrication and education. These spaces are a fairly new phenomenon, but are beginning to produce projects with significant local, regional, and national impact across the globe.

Noisebridge in San Francisco with Mitch Altman | Photo Credit: Mitch Altman

TV: Do hackerspaces respond to the gifted individuals? Said individuals who are very eager to learn while also creative but technically starved. Are these the passionate community dwellers of hackerspaces?

Hackerspaces in China | Photo Credit: Mitch Altman

MA: I can certainly say this helps open up the reach into addressing some of the obstacles in education and building. There are number of more resources mentioned previously that can be overcome with the availability to a local hackerspace. Knowledge and information can be transparently shared at hackerspaces. There is really not much competitiveness; instead, it is overruled by a common thread of learning and grasping with the tools available here. The token to the hackerspaces is learning by making as opposed to a learning by information fed to be absorbed then provided on a test as a validation.

Noisebridge in San Francisco | Photo Credit: Mitch Altman

For the real world of today’s market and work force, this is more analogous to the markets today. More so today, “work” is now perceived and overshadowed by “make and talent.” At hackerspaces, there is not a lot of theory nor standardized constructs of how or why something should be a certain shape, form, or function. Hackerspaces can do without these preconceived notions. Personally, I found out earlier that playing at labs and universities had drawn stronger importance. The need to learn through this atmosphere was very important.

Noisebridge in San Francisco with Mitch in soldering instruction | Photo Credit: Mitch Altman

The ecosystem via interaction with classroom and teachers were an interruption. The peer-to-peer motivation of the lab or hackerspaces can remove this. Now there exist integral workflows which are not interrupted, each fused by desire, passion, and making. I started to learn pragmatically to pair the various realms of quantum physics, electrical, tooling, and coding fueled the continued interest. Keep going. What I used my degree from education was important, but more of an abstraction. The hackerspace labs today have an abstraction to so many way too cool out-of-the-box thinking people. People come together to genuinely share. 

Hackerspaces in China | Photo Credit: Mitch Altman

 

View the part 2 in this interview series with Mitch Altman.

DIY by the numbers: Why the Maker Movement is here to stay

Throughout the world, millions of engineers, Makers, hobbyists, entrepreneurs and innovators are fueling what has been dubbed as the next “Industrial Revolution.”

“The next Industrial Revolution is right around the corner, and it’s going to be bigger than the Internet — or so says a growing army of hackers, designers, artists and entrepreneurs,” USA Today’s Tyler Wells recently penned in a piece detailing the rise of DIY culture, contributing its emergence to the low-cost, high-imagination level of makerspaces popping up across the country.

In the United States alone, there are approximately 135 million adult Makers — that’s well over half (57%) of the American population ages 18 and up — not including children and teens both interested in STEM and tinkering. Evident by the plethora of Maker Faires, makerspaces and other hubs spanning across the nation, this segment is expanding rapidly in size and economic heft. In fact, did you know the Maker Movement pumps roughly $29 billion into the economy each year? What’s even more impressive is that these figures will surely grow as more and more of the population is introduced to and begins to embrace the DIY culture.

“With the right motivation and time on your hands, you can now go through your own personal industrial revolution in 90 days, and can launch a company or product within those 90 days,” TechShop CEO Mark Hatch explains. Furthering the Techshop CEO’s belief, Gartner’s Jim Tully recently projected that by 2018, nearly 50% of the Internet of Things solutions would be provided by startups which are less than three years old.

Martha Stewart, who recently demonstrated her passion for the growing drone community, has also emphasized the importance of the movement time and time again. The queen of DIY revealed, “The Maker spirit is vital to our economy. In the U.S., 28 million small businesses create nearly two out of every three new jobs and employ half the private sector workforce. That’s why I believe it’s so important to support what they do. After so many years of seeking and spotlighting these creative entrepreneurs, I am excited that this movement has finally come to the forefront of American culture.”

Yet, the Maker Movement isn’t only limited to hobbyists and engineers but has transcended well beyond the walls of the 200-plus hackerspaces and labs. Not only is the notion of DIY being seeded and nurtured by Makers, it is in full blossom throughout the world at rapid pace, ranging from consumer products and mainstream retail to manufacturing and consumer goods.

These statistics are a mere testament to the emergence of the movement. Hear ye hear ye, a renaissance is underway!

• In 2013, there were 100 Maker Faires around the world including its two flagship events in the Bay Area and New York and 93 worldwide mini-faires.
• There were over 280,000 Maker Faire attendees in total last year, with a 62% rise in attendance from 2009 to 2013.
• Around 70,000 people headed to World Maker Faire in 2013, with 47% of them being new attendees.
• The White House held its inaugural Maker Faire in 2014. “Today’s D.I.Y. is tomorrow’s ‘Made in America.'”
• MAKE Magazine subscriptions are up to 125,00 and growing at a rate of 20% annually.
• There are now over 200 hackerspaces across the United States. (New York Times, May 2013)
• There approximately 350 Fab Labs spanning across 40 countries. (World Bank, August 2014)
• 3 million people pledged over $480 million in crowdfunding projects in 2013. (The Next Web, January 2014)
• The world’s crowdfunding sites reached close to $5 billion in transactions last year. (Forbes, April 2013)
• Since its launch in 2009, more than $116 million has been raised for over 1,400 technology projects — a number of which have been hardware gadgets powered by Atmel
• By 2025, crowdfunding investment market is projected to reach $93 billion. (PBS, December 2013)
• The 3D printing market is projected to be worth $8 billion by 2020 (MarketsandMarkets, November 2013)
• World demand for 3D printing is projected to increase more than 20% per year to $5 billion in 2017. (Reports and Reports, December 2013)
• Worldwide shipments of 3D printers priced less than $100,000 grew 49% in 2013, reaching a total of 56,507 units. (Gartner, October 2013)
• The U.S. market for 3D printer manufacturing will reach $1.4 billion in 2014, attaining a CAGR of 22.8% from 2009 to 2014. (Forbes, August 2014)
• 3D printers will grow from a $288 million market in 2012 to $5.7 billion in 2017, attaining an 81.9% CAGR. (Forbes, August 2014) 
• Much of the growth in 3D printing from 2014 to 2020 will come from the healthcare and aerospace industries. (MarketsandMarkets, November 2013)
• 67% of manufacturers are currently implementing 3D printing either in full production or pilot and 25% intend to adopt 3D printing in the future. (Forbes, August 2014)
• 48% of large manufacturers plan on returning production in the United States. (BCG, April 2012)
• About 14% of U.S. companies definitely plan to move some of their manufacturing back home. (Wall Street Journal, July 2014)
• Chris Anderson estimates that the DIY Drone community currently boasts well over 15,000 drones, compared to just 7,000 “professional” drones in use worldwide by military forces.
• Etsy has 875,000 shops with 13,000,000 items and out of those, 2,900,000 items sold monthly. (BitRebels, June 2012)
• There are also 15 million DIYers in over 150 countries on Etsy with 690,000 new members joining each month. (BitRebels, June 2012)
• It was estimated in mid-2011 that over 300,000 official Arduinos had been commercially produced, and in 2013 that 700,000 official boards were in users’ hands. (Medea, April 2013)
• Distributors estimate that over one million Atmel powered Arduinos have been sold since 2005. (Designboom, September 2013)

As Arduino’s Michael Shiloh explained, “It [Maker Movement] is sort of like cooking. You don’t need to be a chef to cook, but almost everyone can cook something.” Without question, the Maker Movement has already and will continue to thrive in our DIY-centric culture. In time, we can surely expect to see Makers shape our future — one project at a time.

Don’t forget to join the Atmel team in Queens this week for the 5th Annual World Maker Faire. Undoubtedly, this year will be amazing as an expected 750+ Makers and 85,000+ attendees head to the New York Hall of Science to see the latest DIY gizmos and gadgets, as well as AVR Man in the flesh. Once again a Silversmith Sponsor of the event, Atmel will put the spotlight on everything from Arduino to Arduino-related projects. See you soon!