Tim O'Reilly at PARC

Around the San Francisco Bay Area, a vibrant community of "Alpha Geeks" are already living in the future. These people are the thinkers, designers, engineers, and hackers at the center of the maker movement -- the DIY culture focused on the innovation business and a community dedicated to giving more than you take.

Speaking yesterday at the Palo Alto Research Center at the MAKE Hardware Innovation Workshop, Tim O'Reilly addressed a room full these "Alpha Geeks" -- 150 or so big thinkers who are on the leading edge of the DIY maker community.

"Great things begin with people having fun, but they don't end there", O'Reilly said. He sees MAKE's mission as finding these interesting technologies and people who are innovating from the edge, and amplifying their effectiveness, taking their passion and desire to have an impact on the world and enabling a commercial narrative -- making creativity sustainable by making it a viable business.

We're going through a dynamic shift -- the future is here, O'Reilly says, it's just not evenly distributed yet. Silicon Valley started with hardware, and through the community and open-source environment, hardware is again redefining the maker movement, with makers' tech turning into consumer products at incredible speeds.