* ThingM January Newsletter 2011! *
CONTENTS
– Awesome projects on our blog
– We’re on Alibaba!
– Jameco’s ThingM Review
– Glowpull, a new ThingM technology sketch
– Mike on the design of digital objects
– Unsubscribe
AWESOME PROJECTS ON OUR BLOG
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We have some wonderful BlinkM projects posted to our ThingM blog this month!
DrumKit was the result of a semester of design and prototyping as part
of a product design course at Rensselaer. A collaboration between
Anasha Cummings, Joe DiLuzio, and Dan Zollman DrumKit is meant to
encourage the user to explore music, math, programming, electronics,
and acoustics.
blog.thingm.com/2011/01/thingm-project-feature-blinkm-in-drumkit/
David Enoch has been making handmade lanterns for years. Switching
from halogen and xenon bulbs to ThingM BlinkMs, he was thrilled to
discover that they added a whole new character to the lanterns, as
well as the space where they were hung.
blog.thingm.com/2011/01/thingm-project-feature-blinkm-in-the-lantern/
Jisu Choi and Matt Kizu from Art Center designed “Books with
Personality”. The goal of their project was to create animism in an
object using BlinkM’s. They worked with three books and accentuated
the titles character and were able to develop each personality in
unique way. This experiment came close to becoming a kind of
“psychoanalysis” of an object that explored themes of ego,
vulnerability, intellect, and self-awareness.
blog.thingm.com/2011/01/thingm-project-feature-books-with-personality/
All of these projects, plus many more, are on our blog: blog.thingm.com
ALIBABA
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We’re also proud to announce that ThingM products are now available on
Alibaba, one of the premier sources of manufactured products in the
world! Please visit our company profile and view our products in a
new way!
www.alibaba.com/member/us108809485.html
JAMECO THINGM REVIEW:
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Jameco, a new ThingM distributor, wrote a wonderful review of ThingM
products! A snippet and link to the article are below!
“It’s called the BlinkM Smart LEDs by ThingM. These LEDs
(Light-Emitting Diodes) are much cooler than your conventional
incandescent light bulbs. These LEDs can be programmed to flash, fade,
flicker, and glow to any color combination your heart desires. No
programming experience required. Just plug it directly into an Arduino
microcontroller, a BASIC Stamp microcontroller, or a LinkM USB
Controller and you are ready to light up the night!”
www.jameco.com/Jameco/content/blinkled.html
GLOWPULL
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Occasionally, we decide to explore an idea to the point of making
functioning prototypes. Last year we decided to explore the notion of
decorative consumer products for the home to better understand the
design possibilities of ubiquitous computing. After many months of
playing with capacitive sensing and commissioning custom fabrication
in Milan, Italy we now have a page on our site documenting one of our
ideas: Glowpull, a cabinet knob that glows when you touch it. You can
read about it and see pictures here:
thingm.com/sketches/glowpull.html
MIKE ON THE DESIGN OF DIGITAL OBJECTS
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Mike was invited to present at Microsoft’s Social Computing Symposium
and wrote a presentation on how ubiquitous computing technology will
change the shape of consumer products. You can see and download the
whole thing here: