Announcements

Here is an overview of MAKE 04 from Mark! “The major projects include an electric cigar box guitar, a kit to take high speed strobe photos (so you can capture a balloon or light bulb in mid-pop), and how to turn kids’ electronic toys into musical instruments. There’s also a guide to a bunch of different kinds of kits (electronic, beer making, robots, etc) and a how-to by Mr. Jalopy on converting a vintage hi-fi cabinet into an LP and CD ripper, burner, and player. David Pescovitz started a new column for the magazine called Proto, which profiles cool makers in corporate labs around the world, and Cory Doctorow weighs in on the Supreme Court’s unfortunate Grokster decision.” [via] Link.

On the flight to Amsterdam, for Euro OSCON and the Make Faire, there were entertainment devices in each seat, music, movies, games, etc…all on demand and all quite nice. Turns out, if you try hard, or if the system happens to crash at your seat, you can spot that it runs Linux and you might also get a free premium movie…On the way back, I’ll try and write up how to repeat it. Here’s a photo of the shell, wohoo! Link.

NovySan sent in this list of winners from the designboom’s RE-think + RE-cycle contest earlier this year. There were 2418 designers from 82 different countries that participated. I could spend the entire day looking at these to get project ideas. The winner was a very nice watering add-on for a discarded water bottle. Link.

First there was Modern Marvels and here comes another invention reality show, you know – I’ll watch these, I hope everyone gets excited about people making things and reality TV still attracts a lot of people. American Inventor is an exciting new primetime reality show for ABC from Simon Cowell and the producers of American Idol . Set to premiere in early 2006, the show will undertake the biggest search ever for America’s best new invention. An embodiment of the ultimate American dream, the show will uncover the hottest new product and make some struggling inventor’s dream come true. [via] Link. If anyone knows anyone at either Modern Marvels or American Inventor, we’d love to chat with them!

Ok Makers, start your soldering irons – The History Channel announced they are in search of the nation’s next great invention idea. Inventors throughout time have shared one common attribute – a unique gift for seeing a reality that does not yet exist. The Modern Marvels Invent Now Challenge provides an opportunity for independent inventors to be discovered and to influence the ever-changing face of invention. Link. I read the terms and FAQ, you’d own everything you enter, which is good.