First Drone Games In SF Today

Fun & Games Robotics
First Drone Games In SF Today

By Dale Dougherty

Dale Dougherty

DALE DOUGHERTY is the leading advocate of the Maker Movement. He founded Make: Magazine 2005, which first used the term โ€œmakersโ€ to describe people who enjoyed โ€œhands-onโ€ work and play. He started Maker Faire in the San Francisco Bay Area in 2006, and this event has spread to nearly 200 locations in 40 countries, with over 1.5M attendees annually. He is President of Make:Community, which produces Make: and Maker Faire.

In 2011 Dougherty was honored at the White House as a โ€œChampion of Changeโ€ through an initiative that honors Americans who are โ€œdoing extraordinary things in their communities to out-innovate, out-educate and out-build the rest of the world.โ€ At the 2014 White House Maker Faire he was introduced by President Obama as an American innovator making significant contributions to the fields of education and business. He believes that the Maker Movement has the potential to transform the educational experience of students and introduce them to the practice of innovation through play and tinkering.

Dougherty is the author of โ€œFree to Make: How the Maker Movement Is Changing our Jobs, Schools and Mindsโ€ with Adriane Conrad. He is co-author of "Maker City: A Practical Guide for Reinventing American Cities" with Peter Hirshberg and Marcia Kadanoff.

View more articles by Dale Dougherty
4

Autonomous Flight, with a Few Lines of Javascript

The first-ever flying drone competition for Silicon Valley’s developer community lands today (Dec 1) atย 385 Grove Street, San Francisco, CA.

Organizers of the Drone Olympics

Organizers of the Drone Games, Jyri Engestrom & Chris Sanz, pictured above, write:

“In the next few years the idea of drones willย dramatically change. ย Here’s why.

You no longer need a PhD and security clearance to writeย software for flying drones. The same functions every Web programmer uses to build
apps can now make drones navigate, take pictures,ย find people, fly throughย windows,ย play games, and so on. Whenย the low level control of hardware comes built-in, hobbyists can focus onย writing algorithms and routines.

It wouldn’t be possible if new consumer product companies weren’t buildingย the sub-$300 quadcopters sold at Costco. Butย because they are programmable, they are more than just toys. Hackers andย entrepreneurs who mod them are coming up with ideas that sound like scienceย fiction, such as disrupting the transportationย system using drones. If these visionsย come true, Uber-riding hipsters may findย themselves agonizing over the choice between a black town car and aย quadcopter.

Both of us were always fascinated with robots. We have a great deal ofย respect for those who are involved in the academic side of robotics andย thinking beyond military opportunities. However, it was’t until we gotย involved with a community of drone hackers calledย Nodecopter that we started to truly see theย potential of the drone movement. It canย push things further much faster than any single group or organization.

New code and methods are posted online every day. Because we now have aย large repository of freeย tools to playย with, interest is expanding all over the world. ย Today we’llย showcase some of the most compelling demos at Droneย Games in San Francisco.

“When Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak completed the Apple I, they didn’t alertย the media. They demonstrated it to their soul mates at the Homebrew
Computer Club.” So reads the entry on theย HBCCatย the Computer History Museum.

We can’t wait to see what will be demonstrated at Drone Games today.”

I’ll be there as a judge but I’m not sure what I’m judging. ย  I hope to be amazed.

Tagged

By Dale Dougherty

Dale Dougherty

DALE DOUGHERTY is the leading advocate of the Maker Movement. He founded Make: Magazine 2005, which first used the term โ€œmakersโ€ to describe people who enjoyed โ€œhands-onโ€ work and play. He started Maker Faire in the San Francisco Bay Area in 2006, and this event has spread to nearly 200 locations in 40 countries, with over 1.5M attendees annually. He is President of Make:Community, which produces Make: and Maker Faire.

In 2011 Dougherty was honored at the White House as a โ€œChampion of Changeโ€ through an initiative that honors Americans who are โ€œdoing extraordinary things in their communities to out-innovate, out-educate and out-build the rest of the world.โ€ At the 2014 White House Maker Faire he was introduced by President Obama as an American innovator making significant contributions to the fields of education and business. He believes that the Maker Movement has the potential to transform the educational experience of students and introduce them to the practice of innovation through play and tinkering.

Dougherty is the author of โ€œFree to Make: How the Maker Movement Is Changing our Jobs, Schools and Mindsโ€ with Adriane Conrad. He is co-author of "Maker City: A Practical Guide for Reinventing American Cities" with Peter Hirshberg and Marcia Kadanoff.

View more articles by Dale Dougherty
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