Article on Cleveland.com about our new book The Makers! “The ability to create something from almost nothing is why the 100 grass-roots inventors profiled in “Makers: All Kinds of People Making Amazing Things in Their Backyard, Basement or Garage” so intrigued me. The book is written by Bob Parks, an editor and writer at Wired magazine, but it springs from the minds of the editors and contributors to Make magazine.” Link.
Bug writes “Make your own Mardis Gras mask out of water-hardened leather. Start with vegetable-tanned (also known as saddle-skirt) leather. I picked mine up at a local Tandy Leather. You’ll also need paint suitable for leather (fabric paint usually works).” Link.
Here’s how Wrapper makes custom iPod cases – and their latest, your virtual character on an iPod case – “A cover for an iPod video that features a client’s avatar. We can make great products from online identities used in massively multiplayer games. Unike developers of single player games, MMORPG developers seem relaxed about gamers making copies of their avatars and using them in RL.” [via] Link.
Bruce Stewart, editor of the new ETel site, joins The Distributing the Future Podcast for a look back at the highlights from last week’s O’Reilly Emerging Telephony conference. Josh Kinberg shows you how easy it is to get started with video blogging and what to expect if you just want to watch some good ones. Bruno Souza continues his look at open source in Brazil. Link. MP3.
Great discussion in the MAKE forums! Leenwebb writes – “Like many of us, my house is filled with wires. And until we get the Broadcast Energy Transmitter from the GI Joe movie working, I need the wires. But here’s the thing: they’re ugly. And, often, in the way. So I am putting a call out to all Makers: What do you use for wire-wrangling?…” Link.
Scott writes “For those who don’t already know, the Gimp is a powerful, open source image editing application. For more info on the Gimp visit gimp.org. GIMPshop is essentially the same program with some cosmetic changes. The Gimp’s menu structure and naming conventions had been a constant source of frustration for me because I was so used to Photoshop. So, I did what any hardcore graphics geek would have done. I hacked GIMPshop together.” New version! Link.
News From the Future “Before he became an inventor and businessman, Ron Blum was a practicing opthalmologist. About twice a year, he would encounter a patient whose eyesight was better than 20/20. Such cases of super vision were a phenomenon that Blum and the science of opthalmology couldn’t explain. “I would just say to the person: Consider yourself blessed,” says Blum. “I never would have believed that I would be running a company 20 years later that was developing a product that could give supervision to anyone.” [via] Link.
