Zach Klein, founder of College Humor, Vimeo, CPO at Boxee, and prolific angel investor is taking a swing at combining his expertise in the consumer internet world with a passion for handicraft in a new venture called DIY.org. The company has been quiet about its focus and goals, but here are some interesting hints:

It has an amazing domain name – I wonder if the .org TLD is significant in that there will be a non-profit component? Also, while it is a cool name I imagine the DIY network or B&Q the owners of DIY.com might consider a trademark suit?

Are they making DIY kits? – Founder and CEO Zach Klein posted a question to Quora asking which 3rd party logistics provider worked with BirchBox, the subscription commerce retailer.

Will there be a woodsy theme? – Between the bear claw logo, Klein’s Cabin focused Tumblr, and the desks in the DIY office there is a distinct Jermiah Johnson feel to the brand. Will this be a DIY site in the broadest sense or a back to nature focused endeavor?

They have some seriously smart people – Check out the CV of Andrew Sliwinski, one of the co-founders of DIY. He seems to have done everything from web development to motion graphics to hardware production and show management.  Whatever they choose to focus on, it seems they will have the talent to execute.

Is it a kid focused endeavor? – This photo suggests that the activities they have planned are at least partially kid friendly, but are they taking Klutz’s “Book Plus” concept to the web?

It is too soon to tell with certainty, but my guess is that the initial offering will be something like Instructables with a more user friendly UI married to a BirchBox style subscription ecommerce offering. Whatever it is, I’m excited for the launch. Crafting is a $30B market, but has received only a minuscule amount of attention relative to the amount of investment in music and gaming startups. This seems like a smart team, going after a massive, underserved market so interesting things are bound to emerge. Keep an eye on them.

Some people can be bores on Twitter, posting mundane updates about their favorite tv shows, or the local weather conditions, but NEVER the good people at Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories. They are inventors of fantastic products e.g. A 3D printer that builds objects out of sugar, a robot that draws on eggs and other curved surfaces, and a pseudo-sundial that lets you tell time by shadow.

In my mind their projects combine the best of Silicon Valley engineering, Monty Python humor, and the mid-century exuberance for technology in the home. Whether you are into hard ware hacking, DIY/Crafts, or simply creative people you should consider following:

@EMSL

@Lenore Edman

@Windell Oskay

When a product has success, the PR that follows it usually describes the process of it’s creation as being the flawless execution of a singular vision. Just as Athena was born fully armored from Zeus’ forehead, winning products never meander to market dominance.

After reading a lot of tributes to Steve Jobs I came across an article by Virginia Postrel where she shares a story from Richard Rumelt, a managment consultant who spoke with Steve as he began the Apple turn around process:

Rumelt congratulated Jobs on the turnaround but expressed skepticism about Apple’s chances of overcoming the Windows-Intel lock on personal computers. “What are you going to do in the longer term?” Rumelt asked. “What’s the strategy?”

Jobs, he recalls, “just smiled and said, ‘I am going to wait for the next big thing.’”

Jobs was just trying to stabilize the company and had faith that if his team was allowed to focus on product rather than survival, they would find a new way forward.

This reminded me of the book “DisneyWar” which shares an excerpt of an infamous memo that Michael Eisner wrote when he was chairman at Paramount Studios. His belief was that they couldn’t design blockbusters consistently, but instead needed to focus on a process and values.

“Often the big win comes with the single smash movie. The intoxication of a blockbuster hit can lead to an easy sense the luck will keep striking. Over the past 5 years, Paramount has either been number one or two in the motion picture business. Success tends to make you forget what made you successful, and just when you least suspect it, the big error shifts the game. Will success lull us into the fatal bad play?

We have no obligation to make art. We have no obligation to make history. We have no obligation to make a statement. But to make money, it is often important to make history, make art, or to make some significant statement. In order to make money we must always make entertaining movies, and we make entertaining movies at times we will reliably make history, art, a statement, or all three. We may even win awards. We cannot expect numerous hits, but if every film has an original and imaginative concept, then we can be confident that something will break through.

An apparently no-risk deal is never a valid reason to produce a mediocre movie. A low budget can never excuse deficiencies in the script. Not even the greatest screen writer or actor or director can be counted on to save a film that lacks a strong underlying concept. Ans we should generally resist making expensive overall deals with box office starts and top directors, because we can attract them later with strong material.”

Process along can’t guarantee success. You must have talented people and a coherent culture to enjoy success. Apple faltered without Jobs and Disney’s animation business nearly collapsed by the end of Eisner’s tenure. Still, these two leaders who oversaw arguably the best decades in either of their industries attribute big parts of their success to luck and building companies that had patience to wait for big ideas.

Steve Jobs passed away today and we all can reflect on his amazing legacy, the products that he created, and the legacy he has left. He never wrote a book, but found ways to share his vision and lessons with the world.

Steve Jobs elevated everything he touched to art. The humble commercial became a call to action for a generation of makers.

Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things. They push the human race forward. And while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.

Proved that products are about more than dollars and specs.

Marketing is about values. This is a very complicated world. It’s a very noisy world. We’ re not going to get a chance for people to remember a lot about us. No company is. So we have to be really clear about what they want them to know about us. Our customers want to know what we stand for. What we’re about is not making boxes for people to get their jobs done. Although we do that very well. Apple is about more than that. We believe that people with passion can change the world for the better. That’s what we believe.

And shared lessons learned from one of the most amazing lives of the last century.

Thanks Steve.

This work of art is no mere “Balloon Animal”, but rather the most fearsome creature ever made out of distended latex and clown breath.

If you like this pic, you should check out the comments on the associated Reddit page, the comments are hilarious and informative. One of the comments pointed out that there is now a cable TV show on TLC called “The Unpoppables” that chronicles the rise of “New Balloon Art” and its practitioners.

It is interesting to see how these kinds of shows have evolved from series that focused on fairly capital intensive projects like motorcycle customization to the more accessible cake decorating and balloon animals we see today.

I wonder if all this increased video content/inspiration has caused people to pick up and practice these handicrafts or if it merely serves as a vicarious thrill?

Thanks to @Kn0thing for the link!

Smart/interesting things said by people I follow on Twitter pertaining to Bits and Atoms:

Venture capitalist Gautam Gupta makes a great point about some of the hottest companies of the day e.g. AirBNB, Etsy, etc. that they all bring previously unavailable inventory to the masses. It is an interesting lens to view “Web meets World” concepts through. Rather than try to create new products is there a way to commercialize existing, but SKU-less products?

Ex-Googler Brttany Bohnet shares her love of the Maker Gym, TechShop. TechShop hasn’t made its way to Boston yet, but I agree that having a fully stocked shop of tools AND a creative community changes your perspective on the built world and leads to exciting possibilities.

Make: Magazine publisher and godfather of the Maker movement Dale Dougherty posts a typically deep, important thought. Viewed through the prism of the “Great Stagnation” Making, whether it is restoring cars, home repair, cooking, or artistic expression might be a way to combat stagnating incomes and alleviate some of the social friction between the middle class and super rich.

Chris Anderson is the Editor-in-Chief of Wired Magazine, founder of DIY Drones, and prolific author who recently gave a TEDtalk in Silicon Valley on “New Cybernetics”. Put simply, new ways that technology allows us to measure and improve our own behaviors. His talk touched on three main points:

+ The Hawthorne Effect, a psychological phenomena that causes us to change our behavior when we think we are being watched.

+ Increasingly cheap sensors that make collecting data about our lifestyles possible.

+ The impact that we get when this data is shared socially, and when interfaces like game mechanics are layered on top of it.

These are all provocative ideas, and ones that I fully agree with having seen them first hand in the development of the first blood glucose monitor that works with the iPhone. While the future of mobile healthcare is always interesting, the more important part of this story is Anderson’s predictive track record.

With his book “The Long Tail” he created an analytical framework that helped explain and shape the world Apple, Amazon, and Netflix are bringing us.

With his follow up “Free” Anderson sherpaed us through the world of “Freemium” introducing the concept to the world outside the TechCrunch bubble.

Anderson follow that up with a watershed Wired article called “The Next Industrial Revolution” which provides a roadmap for where a world of ubiquitous 3D printers and CAD programs will lead and will be soon published as a book.

In short, if Chris Anderson is getting interested in the “Quantified Self” “Data Exhaust” “Personal Dashboards” “Connected Health” or any of the other names that are given to this area of inquiry, get ready for it to be HUGE. In the last decade no mainstream writer has had a better feel than Anderson for finding and describing the megatrends that shape industries, so when he talks, listen. At AgaMatrix we are firm believers in this coming wave and we are excited to see that the most influential tech writer alive is as well.

3D Printing is the sexy technology that gets most of the spotlight as it pertains to the world of “Bits & Atoms“. It is an indisputably cool technology, but it is expensive, hard to use, and will face major barriers to mainstream adoption. Still, bits and atoms are fusing in interesting ways that highlight the skill and imagination of lead users, they are just coming from unexpected places.

An example of this creative explosion can be seen in the emergence of a meme where Oreo Cookies are baked inside chocolate chip cookies. This recipe wasn’t handed down from Alton Brown, Paula Deen, or any other Food Network star, but came up from food blogs.

On January 6th Jenny F from Picky Palate seems to have developed the idea of making a “TurDuckEn” equivelant in cookie form.

Within 2 weeks on January 19th “Buns in my Oven” had created an homage to this new concoction.

Just a day later on January 20th“Becky Bakes” tried out the recipe and provided photos of the finished product that would rival anything in a food magazine for quality or styling.

I learned about the recipe on January 26th when someone I follow on Twitter tried the recipe and shared the results.

On February 3rd Amanda from Amandeline raised the bar by taking photos of the finished product and cooking process that would shame any production company working for the Discovery Channel or TLC.

By Feb 5th the recipe jumped the shark when CafeMom’s soulless CMS reduced the concept to a stale imitation of its true greatness.

However, on February 16th the first “Remix” appeared when the awesome blog Serious Eats upped the ante by creating a Nutter Butter cookie, stuffed inside a double chocolate chip cookie.

So within 6 weeks a recipe was created, crossed the country, and was reborn with tools found in any kitchen, ingredients found in any supermarket, and the passion of some “ordinary” foodies. This recipe gained a lot of traction in the social media world without endorsement from Rachel Ray or any other mainstream food press. People rightfully get excited about the future when 3D Printers can create replacement kidneys, but over the next 5 years (at least) I think a lot of  innovation in “Personal Fabrication” will come in kitchens and garage workshops.

And while this may seem like a trifle in comparison to some of the more utopian visions for customization technology it could be serious business. Discovery Communications and Scripps Networks are the parent companies of the Food Network, TLC, HGTV, and a plethora of basic cable channels that feature cooking shows as their mainstream content. Together, their annual revenues exceed $5B. With YouTube creating educational programs to make better video producers, I wouldn’t be surprised to see the basic cable empire crumble due to competition from amazing “amateurs” before the decade is out.

Lego is an amazing company. They have been around for decades, are universally loved by parents and children, and have experimented successfully in a number of interesting areas like robotics.

That said, they should fire all their designers.

Or at least create an API and find a way to get the designs made by their alpha fans to their broader user base. Their fan base is rabid and create as many SKU’s as the staff in Billund Denmark with no expectations of compensation.

A sports fan is petitioning Lego to release Legofied versions of all the Major League Baseball stadiums and the idea has received the endorsements of eminent figures like ESPN’s Bill Simmons.

Some create cute mini-versions of pop culture icons and kick off a new visual style for the product simultaneously.

Or popular video game characters

Others recreate complex mechanical structures like v8 engines.

Or created amazing architectural designs with no precedent in reality. Click through to read the “Director’s Commentary” on the details in the design. It is really an amazing reuse of parts in ways that were never intended.

Or fully functional firearms

Artists have made careers using the plastic bricks as a sculpting medium

Or as an artistic printing press

Of course Lego’s designers do an amazing job with their original creations and Star Wars/Harry Potter licenses, but the creativity of their fans is a force to be harnassed. Of course there are a lot of barriers. For instance, many of the most popular fan designs are feature proprietary IP which would make them difficult to resell, but if I were Lego (Or their competitor MegaBlocks) I’d find a way to productize that creativity.

CTO of Bestbuy pushing bits and atoms

BestBuy’s CTO is pushing a “Bits & Atoms”  vision where drawing apps on the iPad could be outputted and printed as physical books. We can already do that via services like Blurb, shouldn’t be that hard for a company like Penultimate.

Don’t Know your Helvetica from Arial?

Get schooled on Typography from a RISD student named Karen Kavett. I would be dollars to donuts this kind of video will largely have replaced RISD in the next 20 years.

Via @JohnMaeda

Retro Doritos Sell like Crazy

Software designer and junk food connoisseur Cabel Sasser photographically proves that a novel/retro package does indeed move units on a store shelf. This is a good “Natural Experiment” for customizers that shows a “custom” package can drive sales.

KleekBots – iPhone powered Lego Mindstorms

KleekBots aims to bring a smartphone powered Lego Mindstorm system to the masses along with a database of construction instructions. I have some doubts that they will pull it off based on their over serious video, but if someone approached the product the right way it could be a fun business.

Arduino Xmas Tree

I’m a little late on this link, but basically you can control a families Xmas Tree lights via the web. I would gladly pay a premium if I could have an iPad controlled version for my tree next year.