maker

Tooling around San Francisco's TechShop

The maker culture can seem exclusive sometimes, but TechShop is helping to bring the underground community to the mainstream, offering classes and monthly memberships to the general public.

In late June, a fourth TechShop location opened in San Jose, Calif., but it's still building up its own storied history. To see what a TechShop is like after it builds its network of makers, CNET toured the 15,000 square-foot San Francisco location, which opened its doors earlier this year.

During our visit, people where taking prototyping into their own hands. An eclectic bunch of members--including policemen, entrepreneurs, and fashionistas--all … Read more

Basic greeting cards

Making your own custom greeting cards can be a lot of fun, and there are numerous programs out there that can help you with such a project. Photo Card Maker is among the more basic options; it's a good choice for anyone who doesn't need a whole lot of features, but it will likely disappoint those who expect more sophisticated results.

The program's interface is plain and fairly easy to figure out, with its major features represented by a set of icons across the top of the screen. Photo Card Maker comes with 32 templates, which are … Read more

Crave 43: Meeting the Makers (podcast)

What better venue for an episode of Crave than the annual Maker Faire in San Mateo, Calif.? We rub elbows with robots, learn the art of making a Master Chief costume, and meet a group of teens who take Rock Band to its fiery extreme.

Subscribe in iTunes SD Video | Subscribe in RSS SD Video… Read more

This Day in Tech: First look at new Nook, Windows Phone update

Too busy to keep up with the tech news? Here are some of the more interesting stories from CNET for Tuesday, May 24.

Exclusive hands-on: Windows Phone update to integrate apps into hubs CNET gets a close look at four big changes that pertain to apps in Windows Phone 7's next update, code-named Mango. More

B&N's new Nook: Better than Kindle? Barnes & Noble has officially unveiled the second-generation Nook, a touch-screen e-ink e-reader that the company is branding as the "Simple Touch eReader." CNET's David Carnoy gets up close and personal with … Read more

Flip the page

When we first saw the title of this program, we were hoping that it would help us create the flip books of our youth, those tiny cartoons in book form that were animated by the flipping of the pages. As it turns out, Flip Book Maker Free Version is actually a program for creating virtual photo albums, which in our opinion isn't quite as fun. That said, the program still does a good job at what it's meant for, and it's worth checking out if you miss flipping through physical photo albums in this age of digital … Read more

This Day in Tech: Explosion at iPad factory, CNET visits Maker Faire

Too busy to keep up with the tech news? Here are some of the more interesting stories from CNET for Monday, May 23:

Foxconn: No delays in iPad supply after explosion Production was suspended at Foxconn factory in China, pending investigation into last week's explosion that killed three people. More

B&N gets set to launch new Nook (live blog) Barnes & Noble will be showing off a new Nook Tuesday morning. Get the full skinny in real time as we live blog the unveiling. More

Spying elite toys at the Cannes Film Festival This epicenter for international … Read more

Watching the makers make Maker Faire

SAN MATEO, Calif.--"They're putting Josh in the cage!"

It was early this afternoon, and a group of school kids were excitedly screaming those words over and over. And it was true. A kid called Josh was being put inside a cage that was part of a performance by a group called Arc Attack. Soon, the cage would be bombarded with electricity from two of Arc Attack's signing Tesla coils. No Joshes would be harmed in this experiment. But an awful lot of grinning would be done.

This is Maker Faire. Well, almost. The famous DIY festival begins in earnest tomorrow morning, and over the course of the weekend, in excess of 100,000 people may well get themselves to the San Mateo County Event Center here to see countless examples of do-it-yourself robotics; 3D printing; steampunk kinetic sculptures; and much, much more.

But today was setup day, the day the thousands of so-called "makers" arrive, drop their gear, and start building the projects they'll show the tens of thousands of visitors over the next two days. Being at Maker Faire on setup day is both a treat--it's always great to see the process behind something as cool as Maker Faire, and it's nice not to have to compete with 50,000 people to see something--and a curse: Only about half the projects are finished.

One thing that's definitely cool about being on hand for setup day is that each and every time you return to a specific spot, there's more there than there was the last time you went by. Even if that was just 30 minutes ago. A steady stream of trucks, vans, cars, and other conveyances arrive, and with them, the festival comes to life.

Maker Faire started here in 2006, and is now a worldwide phenomenon. From 20,000 visitors that first year to 80,000-plus last year, attendance figures are now expected to hit six figures. At the same time, the festival has planted its flag in other cities, such as Austin and New York. … Read more

Reporters' Roundtable: Inside the mind of the Maker Faire

The Maker Faire is a county fair for geeks. At the upcoming (Saturday and Sunday) Bay Area Faire, instead of jam competitions, there will be radio-controlled battleship shoot-outs. Instead of rows of people hawking snake-oil cleaning products, there are workshops teaching you and your kids how to make model rockets. If you're a nerd, Maker Faires are the events you wish you had when you were a kid.

The Maker Faire is put on by the technical publisher O'Reilly Media, and is in large part the brainchild of Dale Dougherty, who's our guest on this Roundtable. Dougherty is also the editor and publisher of Make Magazine, the magazine of projects you really should find the time to do.

This interview took place at the O'Reilly labs, where the team was preparing for Maker Faire and working on projects for Make Magazine. We talk about more than just these two projects, of course. There's an emerging technology do-it-yourself culture, a growing understanding that buyers of technology do not have to be slaves to it. Furthermore, the tough economy is pushing more people to do hands-on projects. People are learning about, inventing, and re-using technology in ways they never have before, and that's the topic of our discussion with Dougherty.

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Some of our discussion points… Read more

Look forward to ice cream twice as much

Some things are fun to look forward to. The promise of ice cream is certainly one of them. The mere mention of a trip to the ice cream store gives everyone within hearing distance a delicious idea to focus on no matter what they may have been doing before. Suddenly thoughts drift to favorite flavors...and indecision: one scoop or two?

The answer, of course, is two. The Cook's Essentials Double Ice Cream Maker gives those making homemade ice cream two delicious options. The double-barreled kitchen gadget makes two separate batches of ice cream with each container holding .75 … Read more