Dennis Stevens is a ceramic artist and thinker living in San Jose, California. His weblog, Redefining Craft always has novel takes on Craft, the Universe, and Everything. His most recent salvo involves imagining a scenario in which crafty folks actually benefit from PEAK OIL. His article quotes Robert Heinlein, references William Morris, and quotes the great craft philosopher…erm..Hank Williams Jr. Link. On a side note, extremecraft is an excellent blog.
The SWIPE Toolkit is a collection of web-based tools that sheds light on personal data collection and usage practices in the United States. The tools demonstrate the value of personal information on the open market and enable people to access information encoded on a driver’s license or stored in some of the many commercial data warehouses. Link.
MAKE pals Squid Labs hit CNN! High-tech is not a word often used to describe a piece of rope, but add a data sensor to its fibers and you have what its creators call electronic rope technology. The intelligent rope is the brainchild of California-based Squid Labs, an “early stage research and development company” made up of mostly MIT Media Lab graduates. Link.
This site turns any RSS or OPML feed into a PDF file. I have a few ideas on what I can do with this. Once I get the OPML app going I could do an OPML version of MAKE and then convert it to PDF as I add and remove articles (RSS feeds)….could be neat. Link.
When I started thinking about CNC machines, I just wanted a computer-controlled machine that would be able to automatically drill all of the holes in the printed circuit boards that I made, for my Curve Tracer kits (see the link, above). But, the “good” commercially-available machines were priced higher than the amount that I could justify spending. So, I started thinking about what it would take to build one, myself. And, I didn’t want to build one that would cost almost as much as a commercial machine: Otherwise it might have been smarter to just BUY one, to begin with! So, I decided to add “low cost” as one of the design goals. I also expected to end up with one or more additional products to sell, as a result of this project, to (help) justify the time that I spent on it. Link.
This paper steam engine is based on Richard Ademek’s CAD drawing of a Riches and Watts nominal 2 ½ horsepower vertical A-frame double acting simple slide-valve steam engine circa 1870-75. The original engine was used to drive a water pump to irrigate the fields of Norfolk. If this model had a scale, it would be roughly 1:19. I had to double the size of the eccentric and strap in order to make it buildable. Everything else is close to scale, but changed in design and apprearance because, well, paper isn’t iron. [via] Link.
Last night at a mini “MAKER” fair we experimented with a high powered green laser (161mw). We were able to pop a variety of balloons instantly, sizzle our way through some plastic cups and cook a tiny part of a potato chip. Here’s the video! QuickTime (MOV). iTunes: Click here and click SUBSCRIBE.
