Categories
Personal presentation

Kentucky and New South Wales

So over the next 10 days I will be doing talks in two different states, but also on two different continents. Here’s the details, if anyone is interested in coming to say hello!

Tomorrow I am driving up to beautiful Louisville, KY for the Kentucky Library Association Conference. I’m speaking twice on Thursday, once on mobile devices in libraries and once on the future of technology and media. As a native of that fine Commonwealth, I am very excited to be able to be a part of KLA. I’ll have a LibraryBox with me, sharing files as I go…if you have questions or just want a demo, find me and say hello!

Unfortunately, I am not able to stay as long as I wanted at KLA, and I have to head back south on Thursday evening and spend all day Friday packing like mad because on Saturday I leave to give a keynote at the New South Wales State Library in Sydney, Australia. I’m in Sydney all of the following week, and would very much like to have a meetup with all the awesome librarians there. I was thinking of something maybe Wednesday night, Sept 18, but I’m open to suggestions as to where…any natives want to speak out for their favorite pub? I’ll plan something, and send it out to the LibraryBox discussion group as well…maybe we can get some librarians and techies together in Sydney for a few rounds. Email me (griffey at gmail) if you have suggestions, or throw me a message @griffey on twitter.

I’m very excited to get to meet new librarians and talk technology…if you are attending one of the above events, please find me and introduce yourself.

Categories
Personal

Radio Silence != Downtime

There have been very, very few months in the 10+ year history of this blog where I didn’t post at all during a month, but July 2013 turned out to be one of those months. August nearly so, as it’s almost September now. There are lots of reasons, but it’s mostly because I’ve been doing huge amounts of Doing Things That Aren’t Writing, and even when I was writing I wasn’t writing for this site.  The rest of the Fall may be similarly sparse. Let’s rewind and catch up to everything that’s happened since last I posted:

  • The Kickstarter campaign for LibraryBox v2.0 raised 1100% of it’s funding goal, which is the best sort of problem to have. But even so, it’s still a series of increasingly complex problems that require serious time commitment.
  • As a result of suddenly being responsible for fulfillment of said popular Kickstarter, I started a company: Evenly Distributed LLC. You’ll hear more about that as the months go by.
  • I wrote a chapter for a book! In the grand tradition of print material, it will be approximately 2384734 years before anyone sees it, and it will be out of date already, but there you go. My chapter is about why Makerspaces in Libraries are more important for libraries than they are for patrons.
  • Over the next 4 months, I’ll be presenting at the Kentucky Library Association Conference, the State Library of New South Wales eResources meeting, doing a talk for the National Digital Stewardship Alliance Outreach Working Group of the Library of Congress, manning a table at the Atlanta Mini Maker Faire, presenting at LITA Forum, and then taking a vacation.
  • And somewhere in all this, I will set up a workshop and crank out 180 or so LibraryBoxen to ship to Backers all around the world.

This is a weird life, this professional thing I’ve carved out for myself. But I love everything about it, which makes all the difference.

Categories
FutureTech Release_Candidate

RHex the Parkour Robot

This is beautiful and terrifying.

RHex the Parkour Robot – YouTube.

Categories
LibraryBox Maker Personal

LibraryBox v2.0 & the Kickstarter Campaign

ledge wide

Way back in February and March of 2012, I had an idea that was to basically try and take the “pirate” out of the PirateBox project, and make it more friendly to use by libraries. I called this fork LibraryBox, and I rushed during those two months to finish it in time to take it with me to Computers in Libraries 2012 to test it.

That initial 1.0 version was very rough, absolutely a bespoke build and wasn’t something that was easily replicated. It was a proof of concept, though, that was interesting enough that some began to use it, experiment with it, and find it valuable enough to stick with despite its difficulties. But it was clear that making the installation process easier and less error-prone was the primary goal for moving forward.

So I plugged away as I could, and in October 2012 I was able to release v1.5 of LibraryBox, and a complete redesign of the accompanying Web site. The v1.5 was faster, easier to install, and a huge improvement, but only a small step towards what the project could be. The community that sprang up around the v1.5 has also been more robust, and as it grew the list of enhancements grew alongside it. These included the need for anonymous usage statistics, even easier installation, alternative energy sources such as solar, and more direct editing of the pages that LibraryBox serves.

The project has grown from an idea to something that is being used in 14 countries on 5 different continents, by educators, librarians, and technologists trying to distribute digital information in places off the grid. There is a huge list of things that should be done with LibraryBox, and it’s gotten to the point where I simply can’t do them…for both technical proficency and simple logistical reasons. But the project is something I believe in, something that I want to see succeed and be used in even more places. The only way forward that I could see was to find money that could be traded for the expertise and time of someone other than myself.

Thus it is with great excitement that I announce the launch of a Kickstarter campaign to support LibraryBox v2.0. It is a meager amount of money that I am asking for ($3000) and I could easily use 3-5x that amount in various ways…but I wanted to ensure that the project stays true to its open source roots. If you think that LibraryBox is worth supporting, back it for some amount…but more importantly, spread the word. LibraryBox is much larger than just libraries, and the more eyeballs that see the campaign page the more likely it is that it could gather some attention outside of the LibraryLand that we all know and love.

I’m incredibly excited about the project. I’m terrified of seeing how it does on Kickstarter, and if people can grok the potential in the way that the LibraryBox community has. And I’m really looking forward to continuing to work on the project.

Help make LibraryBox great along with me.

Categories
Drones Release_Candidate

Introducing the Domino’s DomiCopter!

Introducing the Domino’s DomiCopter! – YouTube.

Categories
3D Printing Release_Candidate

Myths and Truths of the 3-D Printing ‘Phenomenon’

Really great article about how 3D printing will compliment other manufacturing techniques, and what it’s really good for.

Never before have we had a technology where we can so freely translate our ideas into a tangible object with little regard to the machinery or skills available. Yet just as the microwave didn’t replace all other forms of cooking as initially predicted, 3-D printing will not replace other manufacturing technologies let alone industrial-scale ones for a variety of reasons. It will complement them.

via An Insider’s View of the Myths and Truths of the 3-D Printing ‘Phenomenon’ | Wired Opinion | Wired.com.

Categories
3D Printing Release_Candidate

Pneumatic logic

The RepRap project was how I first learned about 3d printing. It has the remarkable mission, in that I’m remarking about it, of printing all of the parts to make another printer. Wow. Well, in principle, all of the circuits can be replaced with pneumatic ones. And also, you know, it might make a cool theme for a sci-fi flick. Just imagine a 3d printer printing with a background of hydraulic valves, pumps and hoses. Generate a pressure difference with steam and you’ve made a steam punk wet dream.

Categories
Personal presentation

Mississippi Roadtrip

Starting Monday, May 13th, I’ll be starting one of the more unusual speaking gigs of my library career: a roadtrip through the state of Mississippi. I’ll be traveling with a couple of members of the Mississippi State Library Commission, doing training sessions in 4 different cities in 4 different parts of the state in 5 days. Starting in northern MS, I’ll be going from Booneville to Greenville to Flowood to Bay St. Louis, north to south for the distance of the state.

I’ve done plenty of workshops and trainings and presentations before, but this is the first time I’ll be doing the same training this many times this quickly. I’ve also never really been through Mississippi before, and I’m excited to see the state from my car, and have the ability to stop and look around if I’d like.

So: if anyone out there is in MS and wants to say “hey”, come be a part of the training in question. Or give me a yell and maybe we can have a drink one of the nights I’m driving through your area. It’s gonna be interesting.

Categories
3D Printing Release_Candidate

Printrbot Simple

Anyone interested in a $300 3D printer? How cheap can one of these get?

The Printrbot Simple is an exercise in 3d printing minimalism. It includes only what is needed to get started in the world of 3D printing.  At $299, we think you will agree that it is both tiny…and a really big deal.

Printrbot Simple – Beta | printrbot.

Categories
3D Printing Release_Candidate

botObjects | ProDesk3D – The Worlds First Full Color 3D Desktop Printer

This looks great, but screams “vaporware” to me. Mixing PLA after it’s melted to achieve different colors? Auto-leveling build plate? Built in support for PVA dual-extruder supports? It’s all technically possible, but way, way non-trivial.

But maybe! I’ll keep an eye on this one.