Maker Faire, part 2

Maker Faire in bullet points:

Cute and practical: floating speakers, hidden in Mylar balloons.

Artsy and practical: Stop-Motion Armatures, poseable figures that can be photographed serially to create animation.

Pleo, a robot dinosaur pet at the Maker Faire 2007

Artsy and geeky: thereping.

Geeky and cuddly: robotic dinosaur pets, named Pleo, that have a range of sentient-looking behaviors.

Geeky with a hard science edge: Stirling engines.

Quirky technology that has its uses: wood iPods.

A person trying to ride a bicycle with a hinge in the middle at the Maker Faire 2007

Quirky technology that's not useful for anything except to build your character through extreme frustration: bicycle with a hinge in the middle. "You really have to steer it two ways!" said a perplexed guy after making a few wobbly laps on this bicycle. Many people fell trying to ride it.

This peculiar item is in a category that's worth a separate article: quirky / art cars. And it will have a separate post! But first, some snarkiness. Coming up tomorrow.

And here are even more pictures from the Maker Faire 2007