The Faire is Fun, Freaky

I checked out MAKE Magazine‘s Maker Faire today and wow. It’s like a county fair but with all the creative freaks and geeks that grew up ripping the voicebox out of their talking GI Joes, deconstructed dad’s Trash-80, scammed free long distance with blue boxes and set fire to anything just to see how cool it looked. No stinky farm animals here but lots of reconstructed and recycled bits of machinery that give birth to something new. Some highlghts: a wooden bicycle with a Razor scooter handlebar and front wheel, throwable LED graffiti, a jolly Woz tooling around on a Segway while playing polo (GETV interview to come), instruction and kits to build your own radio station (fuck the FCC!), tilty table navigation for digital maps, steam powered mechanical computer, robots of all sizes shapes and destructive potential, rude bears, pinball machine utopia!, real time constellations, lots of happy kids building something. Yes, the geeks have taken over the county fair.

Update: This CNET article sums up the atmosphere quite nicely.