Tech & Internet

In March 2010 I gave a talk at the MIT Sloan School of Management on RepRap and the democratization of Fabrication Technology and emergence of open hardware communities, entrepreneurial spin-offs, etc. Bre Pettis and Zach "Hoeken" Smith took the stage right after me and they really rocked with their Makerbot and Thingiverse story (due to form and substance)!

The Innovation Lab meeting was organized by Professor Eric von Hippel at MIT and author of Democratizing Innovation (available under Creative Commons license).

I finally took the time to upload the slides.


Source: OpenOffice

Feel free to ask questions or provide suggestions (other than about the formatting, which Slideshare messed up a little).

There are so many ways to get to a 3D model. Some are really great if you like programming. It is really powerful to use logic to generate objects, but not for all models. Those who are better with visual modalities will probably not like such a system much, and will like the following. Besides scanning software, modeling software is also rapidly improving in terms of usability.

There are already great pieces of software that can be used for 3D modeling of meshes.


It already shows how you can make 3D modeling accessible and still be very powerful. I would like to think about how we can achieve both with relatively simple means and do it better than in Minority Report.

Blender is another excellent product that's open source. Since version 2.5 the sculpting system has seen a major update. That it's powerful can be understood better by seeing in than by reading about it:


The problem is that the user interface is usually still in 2D and is not intuitive for beginners. A 3D interface would not only drastically reduce the learning curve for working in 3D, it would also be a lot more impressive and work much faster:


It should be possible to implement this with off the shelf parts and open source software (something interactively adjusting blender's perspective).

The wii remotes could provide useful for head and cursor (or finger) tracking. To get a "3D screen" you could use shutterglasses to generate a stereoscopic interface, or you could even more cheaply create a lower fidelity interface by just adjusting the perspective relative to head movements.


Download and print two LED clippy's on your RepRap, or if you don't have a 3D printer at home, make them yourself with some wire and Scotch Tape:


Or buy off-the-shelf LED glasses. Here you should probably still replace the LED's with IR LED's if you want proper contrast with the wii-mote setup.
You could create a custom HID device or USB joystick with an Arduino. Or just put an off-the-shelf 5 euro (including shipping) IR emitter around your wii-mote or webcam.

Years ago I blogged about creative wii interfaces. You don't need expensive equipment to make interesting interfaces 3D like Leonar3Do:


Now the great thing about what you see is that it's not THAT complicated!.

For those of us who have RepRaps or don't hesitate to tinker with hardware, we can make the system as elaborate as you wish, building data-gloves and such. A quick google gives you things like the ZerkinGlove, built in a day and using mostly parts from Sparkfun:


Many of the parts for such an interface could be 3D printed (to exactly fit your body, you should sculpt the second iteration with the system from the first iteration).

But I like the simplicity of a simple '3D mouse' with buttons that has three markers, since most of the solution would be in software and anyone can easily get it working with standard webcams/wii-motes and software they can download. It's easier to replicate such a setup. Another option would be to use a phone (android based) and connect it to you computer directly via bluetooth, or to your arduino prototype rig (via the amarino toolkit).

Zie dit YouTube filmpje. Behalve dat het een erg mooi promotiefilmpje is zit hier een duidelijke visie achter.

Bij FESTO is het interessant om te zien hoe zij omgaan met innovatie. Ze zien inspiratie uit de natuur (terecht) als waardevolle bron (ik ook in mijn bachelors thesis over biologically inspired evolution of artificial neural networks). Onze 'rigide' ontwikkeltechnieken een gedachten zijn wat dat betreft heel erg beperkt door 'best practices' en traditionele vormen van onderwijs. Veelal wordt instructionalisme toegepast (vertellen hoe het moet) in plaats van constructivisme (middelen geven om zelfstandig te ontdekken). Naast expermenterend leren is de bereidheid om kennis te delen een belangrijke voorwaarde om kennis te vergroten. In tegenstelling tot andere 'eindige' productiefactoren, zoals natuurlijke hulpbronnen, neemt kennis in waarde toe wanneer het gebruikt wordt (Nonaka en Takeuchi 1995, Overbeek 2008). Delen en experimenteren de speerpunten van DigiMaster, een project waarvan ik de systemen en het webdesign gemaakt heb.

Geen van de dingen uit de filmpjes zijn nieuw, al zijn ze erg netjes geimplementeerd:

• De iFab (filmpje hier, of onderaan deze post) is bijvoorbeeld geinspireerd door de RepRap (Open Source) en Fab@Home (Open Source), gecombineerd met een paar interessante eigen ideeen.
• De autonome robots zijn o.b.v. bekend ROV onderzoek en ook Open Source uitgevoerd door (beroemde) hobbyisten (Chris Anderson).
• Ook de modulair zelfreconfigurerende robots bestonden al wel (Cornell's Open Source Molecubes). De behuizingen en diverse onderdelen zijn overigens weer te 3D printen met de RepRap (of iFab).

Toch zijn het middelen om constuctivistisch te leren en hetgene daarmee geleerd is vervolgens productontwikkeling op een hoger niveau te tillen. Deze middelen komen, mede dankzij internet, open (source) development en 3D printing, steeds mee in de handen van de amateurs (Democratizing Innovation, zie von Hippel). Open Source is in mijn ogen een heel geschikte enabler voor kennis delen en vermeerderen (diffusion of knowledge) en ook om het te consolideren in toolchains (open source projecten) die toegankelijk zijn voor constructionist learning.

Interessant om te zien, vooral ook de iFab omdat zij daarnaast voor meer dan 20.000 producten de CAD modellen online hebben staan in diverse formaten. Ze nodigen hiermee hun klanten uit om te experimenteren met hun producten en ze te verbeteren (von Hippel).

Bronnen:

• Zykov, V., Chan, A., Lipson, H., (2007) Molecubes: An open-source modular robotics kit, Proceedings of IROS, 2007
  
• Hippel, E., von (2006). Democratizing innovation. Massechusets: MIT Press.
  
• von Hippel, E., (2007), Horizontal innovation networks—by and for users, Industrial and Corporate Change.

I read the Guardian article about "building an open source world", on which I have some comments about this.
In the article this remark is made:
"Open source hardware doesn't have the same power as software if only because the final product, as opposed to the designs, can't be replicated for no extra cost as software can."

I'm involved with the RepRap project (also in another Guardian article). I also built a 'machine that can make almost anything'. I'm now building 6 more machines in a group, and the project has already attracted a new group who want to start building.

While in essence the statement about non-free distribution of physical goods is true, we're working hard to mitigate that. We're working on making sure it can use garbage plastics (since we have an abundance of garbage) and it could in principle recycle its own products. The costs of the plastics that we can use are significantly lower than that of commercial 3D printers (about 20 times cheaper, just like the machine itself). There's also an opportunity for home-grown biodegradable plastics (plastics from starch). An interesting remark about this is:
"In a sense, hardware is becoming much more like software, up to the point where you actually fabricate an object," von Hippel says. "That's why you're starting to see open source techniques in hardware. Design is largely going to shift out from manufacturers to the communities."
Source: Eric von Hippel of MIT

Last year, I attended the Rapid Manufacturing and Mass customization conference. Frank T. Piller, considered the guru of Mass customization, said that manufacturing will start happening closer to the consumer, and that the demarcation between producer and consumer will become more blurred. Also, Terry Wohlers, consultant in Rapid Prototyping (also called 3D printing), used the example of an open source fabricator and highlighted the concept of neighborhood fabrication. Granted, he does have reservations for mass adoption.

In the near future where people have fabricators at or near their home (right now RepRap's diffusion is amazing) products would be distributed digitally and produced locally.

The network effects of the RepRap community and the installed base of RepRaps are compelling. I've documented some of the growth characteristics of the RepRap community on my blog here.

The community has also become more organized and shops have oriented themselves around the concept. Now, for the non-technical people, or those with little time, there is now a kit available for about 750 pounds with which you could build a RepRap (equivalent) in 2-3 days (my estimate).

And an interview with Eric von Hippel:

URL: von Hippel interview

They discuss fabricators reaching the home at some point in time. Von Hippel (in the video, here's another), whom I referred to in my earlier blog, is a did seminal work on the origin innovation.

Here's a Google TechTalk about Innovation. It's told in an amusing, motivating way. It's mostly about being restrictive, overprotective and being too prudent, you would risk ruining a technological revolution. Also, he brings forward the risk of business method patents.


Some remarks that struck me:

• Patent quality and use is very low (also brought forward by Chesbrough and others).


• Offensive use of patents (as opposed to defensive)


• A great empirical argument: "When you're extending copyright terms, don't extend the for dead people. It is unlikely you will spur innovation by doing so.". Can't argue against that!
  
• "Ninety-something percent of all western culture, produced in the last hundred years, is A is under copyrighted and B has no identifiable copyright owner which means that copyright is locking it up while providing absolutely no benefit."

Have you ever been in a foreign country in need of a translation? Or you stumble across a manual that's only in foreign languages... Going to google and typing over all the text tedious. You may not even have a computer at hand (e.g. when you're on the road) or it may not be connected to the internet. When you have a mobile phone with internet access, you could use go to google translate, but typing on a mobile phone is even more of a pain in the ...er... fingers.



For a final year course at the University of Tilburg, Seminar of IT, we have an assignment to create a mashup of various systems including Evernote. Evernote can recognize typed and handwritten text in images, via technology called 'OCR' or optical character recognition. It becomes much more than just a searchable image store, since you can take all your notes with you on an internet enabled phone, synchronize them with your PC, etc. There are many uses of Evernote. After exploring trivial uses of Evernote, we decided to make a more sophisticated application, called TranslateAnywhere, which integrates Evernote's OCR and various other services to create a solution to the scenario explained above.

Below is an overview of what happens. A snapshot is taken and sent to Tarpipe, which is a mashup tool. This tool posts it to Evernote for you and fetches the recognized text. Tarpipe than forwards that text to my scripts that call the Google's translate API for a translation. This translation is then sent via SMS. The result is received on the phone (within a minute under ideal circumstances).


Figure 1: Overview of the system interactions

It's not really a complex system (few interactions, and through clear APIs) but it is a pretty long chain involving many nodes (most are online services). Below is the more detailed picture, which is still a bit oversimplified, but hopefully clear:



Here's a presentation detailing our findings about Evernote (including comparisons):

The digital and physical world were once separate. Now, there are more and more physical products with a link to the digital world. The extreme situation is that a product ID will have a link to its source code for fabrication on a personal fabricator or a nearby fabrication service bureau. But also on shorter notice, we will see a lot more convergence.

Consider it less than 2 years from now before a major fraction of the general public has a (camera enabled) phone with internet that can scan UPC/EAN bar-codes (or any bar code for that matter). Applications like 'CompareEverywhere' are already made.
It is nice to see that the android equipped phones (open source OS) have the hardware to quickly scan barcodes and look them up:


It is then completely possible to bypass the shop's AND manufacturers information push and read reviews, compare prices and find another store. This will increase the buying power (flattens the price surplus that shops can get away with charging), reduce the amount of biassed information we will use for buying. Future version of this application (on the phone) would soon know your 'eco preferences', whether to allow GMO food or not, constrains about diet (e.g. allergy information), etc. etc. The information that is provided will be peer-reviews that are managed similar to how Wikipedia is.

The radical change is not just 'more' information, but more accurate, fair information while enhancing the shopping experience (integrate with you shopping lists, integrate making the purchase (since you've already scanned the items)). It will be possible to apply this in the entire life cycle of a product: When you throw away a package of an item you don't want to run out of, you can scan the barcode and confirm a repurchase (adds it to the shopping list) and where applicable, recycling information is given (how to remove the battery, what plastics were used, etc.). Non-consumables could be added to eBay almost automatically, while requiring almost no manual work to make the entry, since details regarding standard products can be found via the UPC/EAN code.

If products can carry an ID, an online record of its 'history' can be made (e.g. in the physical markup language).

In fact, the software already exists and is open source and installable. For a J2ME (requires MIDP2) enabled camera phone you can download zebra crossing (zxing). Find it here: Google Code: ZXing

We will have more power to make our intentions (through purchase) influence corporate decisions. When organizations have not allowed an eco-audit for their products, you have the opportunity to choose other products.

This barcode reader innovation has the ability to reach everyone with a cell phone in a very short period of time, since its mostly a software upgrade and it has viral effects (it will spread by people seeing someone else use it in a store). Of course the applications will evolve. The interface will become more seamless like this:

Oskay, from Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories made this thing: a snow flake generator.

I absolutely love it! I'll tell you why... Not as much that we can now make snowflakes, but the fact that these application/generators are emerging!

Customization!

This is what customization is so powerful for, you have a 'meta-model' of a type of object that is unsuitable for 'one size fits all' mass-production. Keeping a variety on stock is expensive, and how many permutations do you get if you allow 2 choices for 8 aspects of an object? 2*2*2*2*2*2*2*2 = 2^8 = 256. These costs go up if you want to give more than just two choices. You need massive production runs and not to mention sales to earn back the costs of moulds or dies. Moreover, keeping a large variety in stock is expensive and you deal with inherently uncertain demand. What will you stock and how much? All permutations? Or will you base your up-front investment on sales forecasts that tend to be biased by either subjectivity or an over-dependence on historic data?

Sustainability?

I tagged this post with 'energy/sustainability' as well. Why? Because currently, there's massive over-production and dumping of products for which the sales were over-estimated. All the energy and material resources that are used are costs, for the manufacturer, but also for society as in so called "externalities".

Processing.org

What I also like is the choice for processing.org. I like processing since it could also directly control a RepRap 3D printer and/or laser cutter (with the serial library) and/or it could run as a design tool embedded in web pages. Actually, I've been meaning to create a generator myself, in order to create STL files based on simple parameters and a click & drag system. There's this library that I tried to implement, but I guess I dove in too deep into processing.org (for a first dive, that is).
This is the lib: http://workshop.evolutionzone.com/tag/stl/

BudgetDedicated's Sponsored Challenge

I'm co-founder of BudgetDedicated, who actively sponsor open source projects:
"We actively encourage and support an open-source ecosystem. We support businesses that create revenue around open-source software. We also encourage adoption of open standards. We supply bandwidth and a server for the official Wine repository, because we feel it is important to be able to switch to Linux and still run the few win32 programs you can't say goodbye to yet. We sponsor the RepRap project with bandwidth and a server (seeding torrents and hosting ISOs). BudgetDedicated is comitted to help making the RepRap project a success. We have also built our own RepRap. "

If anyone needs to have a server to experiment (for a combination of server an client side computing) on, we'd happily offer this capacity free of charge. My only demand is that the developed application is offered free of charge and under an (OSI approved) open source license. The server could be any Linux distribution you're familiar with. Another platform is possible but needs justification (especially windows, since it doesn't scale well/cheaply). I'd even try to find the time to help out with interfacing. It needs not be processing.org at the client-side: an AJAX based parametric modeler with a thicker server-side layer would also be great.

Oskay, thanks for taking this pioneering step and sharing it!

I've settled for a WM6 equipped HTC device: The HTC Touch Cruise. A fairly nice device. It doesn't look as fancy as the iPhone, but it is very well equipped and there are many applications available for WM6. I can watch online-streams, youtube, etc. I can telephone over VoIP and/or skype, so calling is essentially for free (granted that you have an unlimited internet subscription). It even synchronizes with my Google Calendar through oggSync (limted freeware). Still I don't really like the situation. I would neither really like to have an iPhone, regardless of the appealing looks.

My perfect phone has to have an open environment in which I'm able to do and change everything to my liking. Besides being able to SSH to it, it should still have decent hardware and a good UI, though. Now, it seems that the first important step is made, the linux kernel now runs on the iPhone!


iPhone Linux Demonstration Video from planetbeing on Vimeo.

This is another good example of very capable hackers opening up yet another device and freeing it from its proprietary & closed-source OS
This will allow for a more intense user-centric innovation of phone software. I think it will become interesting...

Another nice example is the CHDK (the Canon Hack Development Kit).

It allows anyone to easily upgrade various Canon camera's with many profesional features and new customization options without much risk of irreversible damage (YMMV). It only boots up with the firmware you load on the SD card, when you remove those files, it will boot up with the regular system. It is an interesting strategy for Cannon to allow this to happen, because Canon will surely learn a lot about what users do with a camera that they can adjust to their needs. They can start incorporating a selection of these features on their standard models, and/or support a more general plug-in mechanism.

It is an open source toolkit that allows you to:
- Motion detection - Trigger exposure in response to motion, fast enough to catch lightning.
- USB remote - Simple DIY remote allows you to control your camera remotely.
- Zooming during filming! - You can now finally zoom in/out WHILE recording a movie clip.
- IR remote control - Do zooming and shutter control wireless with an standard Apple Remote.
- Time lapse - it allows better control over time lapse. E.g. you can create a movie of small seeds growing to become small plants!
- Scripting interface - including a simple BASIC language
- Bracketing - take multiple snaps almost simultaneously with different exposure, aperture, ISO, and even focus. You can later digitally combine the pictures using masks, etc.
- Games - Play Reversi, Sokoban or 4-in-a-Row on your camera.
- RAW - CHDK can record raw files, giving you access to every bit of data the sensor saw, without compression or processing. Raw files can be manipulated on the camera, or processed on your PC. CHDK also has experimental support for the open DNG raw standard.
- Override Camera parameters - Exposures from 64s to 1/60.000s with flash sync. Full manual or priority control over exposure, aperture, ISO and focus.
- Video Overrides - Control the quality or bitrate of video, or change it on the fly.
- Scripting - Control CHDK and camera features using ubasic and LUA scripts. Enables time lapse, motion detection, advanced bracketing, and much more.
- Many user-written scripts are available on the forum and wiki.
- Edge overlay - Detect the edges in a scene, and display them later. Ideal for timelapses, stop-motion, stereography and much more.
- Live Histogram - CHDK includes a customizable, live histogram display, like those typically found on more expensive cameras.
- Zebra-Mode - Displays under and overexposure areas live on the screen.
- GRIDS - Create custom grids and display whichever one suits your shooting conditions.
- Multi-Lingual Interface - CHDK supports about 13 languages, and adding more languages is simple.
- DOF Calculator - Display detailed DOF information on the screen.
- Customizable OSD - Improved display of battery status, free space, camera parameters, and much more. Fully customizable with an on-screen editor.
- Filebrowser - Manage files without a PC.
- Textreader - Display text files on your camera.
- Benchmark - Compare the performance of your SD cards.
- User Menu - Edit your own customizable User-Menu for fast access to often used features.
- there is even more → read the Manual & explore this wiki.


This video nicely shows many of the new features you get (french language)
Various canon models are supported. My camera (IXUS 90 IS) is too new but someone is working on a port. My older canon camera with a broken screen can still become useful, though. I could use it as a security camera with round robin snapshots (only when motion is detected) with a small SD card in it...

You may have noticed 'Use Firefox!' pictures on many websites. There's a story behind this which applies to me as well.

As a web developer, even when you only use Linux, you inevitably get frustrated by the enormous pool of problems caused by deliberate non-compliance of Microsoft's browser "Internet Explorer". Just like there are standards to drive on the right side of the road in one country (for people to drive safely), there are standards that ensure everyone that uses a web-browser can work reliably. But now we can't even afford to have differences between countries, since the internet is an inherently global network. While non-compliance of web-browser technology doesn't result in lives lost as directly as car safety standards, it is an enormous economic loss and makes the web a much less fun place than it could be. It is clear that if, for example, an office of a financial institution can't use e-mail for an entire day, this results in lost productivity. Imagine what it would mean if the browsing experience is limited for over a decade... Browser non-compliance is why websites often don't work well, despite extra effort of web-developers trying to get it to work mostly in the most important browsers, and most versions of them. It is not unwillingness of developers, things just become much more complex that they would need to be. When different versions react differently you have to add exceptions that run in one of the two browsers (within an if condition). But sometimes the amount of combinations of 'browsers times versions' becomes so big, that you cannot write exceptions anymore. This is when you need to start using a framework that abstracts away version issues. Essentially, you're adding extra software to reduce the complexity. This software can be written and improved by many people, since many sites can use it. It has even become quite sophisticated. This does not mean that it wasn't a responsibility of the browsers to conform to standards, so everybody can view the same content reliably. Also, learning a framework is like learning a new language, and more importantly unlearning the old way of doing things.

Many web developers use jquery (I do) or scriptaculous (I tried, too big for my purposes) to make up for the non-compliance to CSS in Internet Explorer. It only takes one browser (internet explorer) to ruin it for everyone, because we are all forced to design for it. When you know this, it becomes increasingly frustrating when you're mixing up 'the old' ways of doing with the new ways and finding out about the quirks of the new framework.

I'm now sure that I spend more than half the time of making a website on making it work in multiple browsers at the same time. Yet, when it works in Firefox, I'm can be pretty confident that it works in Google Chrome or Safari, since they adhere to standards much more than Internet Explorer. The few problems I have with those are pretty easy to fix or usually not even perceived by most web-visitors.

You can't really change the browser population much by asking people to download another browser. People are too lazy to change and that's the main reason why Internet Explorer has enjoyed a major market share for all this time. Facing reality, I'm now forced to start understanding jQuery and why it isn't behaving either... when really get stuck, I have to rewrite everything to scriptaculous I guess...

So thank you Microsoft for making web development a whole lot less fun (and elegant) and making the web a much more unreliable medium.

When researching the distributed user-centered innovation process, I came across this lecture by Eric von Hippel (see below). Also, in my presentations I've quoted Eric von Hippel a couple of times. He researches how innovation driven is often driven by users and what the effects of that are. It is very applicable to what the emerging FabLabs and RepRap project are doing.

When extending the open source concept from software to 'hardware' (as in actual, physical things) von Hippel says the following:
"... In the case of open source software this is possible because innovations can be “produced” and distributed essentially for free on the web, software being an information rather than a physical product. In the case of the sports innovation example, however, equipment (but not technique) innovations are embodied in physical product that, to achieve general diffusion, must be produced and physically distributed. These activities generally involve significant economies of scale. The result, in the case of the windsurfing example and for physical products generally, is that, while innovation prototyping and field trial and refinement can be carried out by users and within user innovation networks, production and diffusion of the physical products incorporating those innovations will usually be carried out by manufacturing firms. ..."
Source: von Hippel, E., Horizontal innovation networks - by and for users, Industrial and Corporate Change Advance Access, published May 16, 2007, p. 22

In 2007, the RepRap project was not well known (an still isn't know to the average person) and had not produced many visible results. But right now (Q3 2008), there are more and more people printing 3D designs to actual physical objects and they are blogged more and more often adding to the publicity for RepRap. Also, thingiverse.com (a project initiated by RepRapper Zach Smith) allows 3D printable designs to be shared with the world, or downloaded for printing. Von Hippel acknowledges the trend of user being in control of designing and innovating objects and RP (3D print) service bureaus to offer manufacturing as a service. Along with that, RepRap now has the potential to really to reach every home that wants a 3D printer

"In a sense, hardware is becoming much more like software, up to the point where you actually fabricate an object," von Hippel says. "That's why you're starting to see open source techniques in hardware. Design is largely going to shift out from manufacturers to the communities."
Source: Eric von Hippel, MIT



In his talk I noticed a strong resemblance with C.K. Prahalad's when it comes to turning manufacturing on it's head. C.K. Prahalad, in his book "The new age of innovation", argues that companies should service users so that they can innovate the products. In this co-creation process, where much of the innovation comes from the customer, it becomes possible to tailor products to the needs of a market segments as small as a single individual, while utilizing a global pool of service providers.