While there are certain folks who consider themselves "crafters" and others who would call themselves "techies" — I really consider all of them makers. Anyone who works with their hands, has boundless curiosity and wishes to bend technology in ways they see fit spans across multiple groups of creators. What's interesting is the intersections between normally separated groups — at our magazines (MAKE and CRAFT) we see a lot of projects combining electronics and what would be considered a "traditional" craft, like sewing. A few examples...




In MAKE 09 we have a great article on how to work with carbon fiber — originally used in aerospace, carbon fiber is extremely strong, but extremely light. So what would you do with it? Make your own iPod case with it, of course. Makers can form, lay up and cure their own high-performance composites. Making advanced materials and then using patterns (like the iPod pattern we supply) is becoming more common. Heck, you can even make kevlar using this tutorial! I fully expect to see a series of handmade artsy carbon fiber iPod cases on Etsy very soon — before Etsy there really wasn't a place where Makers could put their goods out there for exactly the right buyers.

========



In our premiere issue of CRAFT we featured twenty three projects with a "twist" — embroider your skateboard, light up your clothing, knit your own boots, stitch a robot...My favorite piece is The Electric Tank Top by Leah Buechley. It uses silver-coated thread and a microprocessor to make programmable LED clothing.

========

We (MAKE) are pleased to have a place on ETSY (make.etsy.com) where we can showcase our homemade projects (like the carbon fiber iPod cases, LED shirts ad more). I'm hoping to see a lot of projects we've covered in our pages made and remade and then showcased on Etsy for everyone to enjoy.

As we roll through 2007 with a place on Etsy for more "techie" goods I think there's something else we'll see — kits, and lots of them. You see, in the early 1900's and up until maybe the 70's, DIY (do-it-yourself) electronics were pretty much the only way a lot of projects were created. Millions of people built their own radios, and later kit companies came along and created a wide variety of electronic kits mostly aimed at the hobbyist. While kits have always been around somewhere, their popularity fell off the map some time in the 1980's.

Low cost goods from overseas, decreasing free time and the smaller number of people with the skills to solder or build really made it difficult for a lot of us to get excited about the prospects of new kits coming out.

However, something has changed in the last two to three years. People have started taking things apart and figuring out how they work, voiding warranties or simply exploring something that was broken. (Since everything breaks more now.) Also, the internet really took off — and I don't mean connectivity, but blogs, RSS and easy-to-publish sites where information about all this stuff was cataloged. As more and more people started tinkering, it became clear that building electronics again just might be something folks would consider fun — a newly re-discovered hobby.



For me, the best example is the MintyBoost USB charger kit we carry at MAKE — it's an extremely simple kit to build, but it's powerful, literally — it's better than any other iPod charger out there (it uses power more efficiently than every single iPod 9V battery charger) and you build it inside an Altoids tin, which we all have laying around somewhere.

Here's a video we created that shows you how to make one (along with how to make your own MP3 player, too!)

Building an iPod charger certainly isn't like making your own FM radio or robot. It's really unclear where all of this making is going, and whether we're in a renaissance of "making things" again. However, I'm sure this is how something like that would begin!

- Phillip Torrone, Senior Editor, MAKE

Some words from maker Etsy sellers:

GeekGear:

"Many of the ideas that inspire me come from Instructables, Makezine, Gizmodo, Hackaday.com and the new Hakzine.com...I think that part of the reason that my Etsy store has been somewhat successful is because there are not many 'tech' sellers and my items tend to be unique (I hope)...Most of the items I sell are given as gifts to husbands and boy friends."

blinkybug:

"I do periodically browse the 'Geekery' category and drop people a line if I like their stuff. I also meet a lot of like-minded people through various communities in the San Francisco area, e.g., Dorkbot, the SFMicrocontrollers group, the Burning Man crowd, etc."