interactive screen pdx makers
DESCRIPTION
Presentation for Interactive Screen on Maker Culture - using PDX as an example.TRANSCRIPT
Praxis Makes Parfait
Looking at Making through the lens of Portland Maker Culture
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Interactive ScreenAugust 14th 2009
Banff New Media Institute
Why are makers making?
● Has consumer culture lost a certain cachet?● Has the internet let like minds find each other?● Is the DIY aesthetic more popular in any way?● Is this a way of socializing?● Is this a way of showing off?● Are we doing it for money? For beer?● Is there a need to interpret the world through
the critical lens of tactile experience? Or what?● Is this uniquely a PDX experience?
Approach
● This presentation will be example based – showing examples of Maker activity in and about Portland Oregon.
● Will share projects I contributed to - and projects of friends - all of us participating in the Maker community of Portland Oregon.
● I don't have answers as to 'why' we do this - so maybe you can provide them?
Donald Delmar Davis – Dorkbot Lab
● Hosted at Pacific Northwest College of Art● Lectures, lessons and hacking on Electronics
Urban Edibles
Marc Powell's Food Genome Project
Amber Case – Cyborg Camp
● Unconference about the future of the relationship between humans and technology
● Cyborg Anthropology, post sapiens philosophy
Ward Cunningham - Cybords
David Frech - muForth
● muforth.nimblemachines.com
Calagator.org● So many geek events in PDX that we got
together to write a calendar to track 'em... hmm.
Matthew Stadler - Suddenly.org
WhereCamp PDX
Commonalities
● Portland seems to be a hugely social geek town● The social geek seems to be a new phenomena● Cross disciplinary interests● A lot of food related interests● A lot of technology to 'support' other interests● Tend to be smaller faster fun projects● Tends to be a way people socialize● People are learning hard core skills - fast
Shape of physical space● Lots of co-working spaces● Everybody around one big table● Often each working on their own projects● Simply sharing proximity and conversation● Often highly wired via twitter● Often peeps are not spending a lot of $$$● Often peeps have a lot of free time● Often just not happy with consuming media● Often trying to rope peeps into activities
Paige Saez - Makerlab Sundays● Skill share, food, conversation, music, art● Powerpoint Karaoke, Software Hacking
Makerlab – Isoluminant Images
Makerlab – Whereis Project
Makerlab – ImageWiki / ImaWik Project
A bewildering blurring of boundaries
● Recreating patterns that we use at work, scheduling, planning, coordinating, technology
● Groups I've seen are more balanced, men women, sexual orientations, age and race
● Musicians, programmers, artists, electronics hobbyists, experts and amateurs
● For profit and open source interests● Artistic and Pragmatic technical interests● Tending to be largely secular for some reason?● Are people more comfortable now on stage?
Is it the tools that make us make?● http://barcamp.org Social engineering practices● http://wk.com - Portland Incubator Experiment● http://sparkfun.com● http://processing.org● http://etsy.com● http://arduino.cc● http://openframeworks.cc● http://github.com● http://portlandtechshop.com ● http://makezine.com … and the list goes on ...
Why are Makers making?