Tales from the road, Maker Faire Austin 2008

For the last 3 years we’ve put on an event called “Maker Faire” — it’s a celebration of art, science, engineering and crafting. Year one we had 20,000 people then it doubled to 40,000 and earlier this year we had over 65,000. I’m on a plane right now getting back from our 5th Maker Faire in Austin, Texas. We won’t know the total number of attendees for a few more days but we all seem to agree it was a lot bigger this year. There were about 400 “Makers” as we call them, who brought out their projects to share with tens of thousands of attendees. The Makers, as well as the folks who come out, don’t belong to any one demographic. There’s everyone and every age.

Of course there are lots of kids at Maker Faire, but the “kids today” are more like little business people — they have laptops, cell phones and they all knew how to find the free wi-fi we had. A group of kids came up to me in the MAKE booth . They took photos, tagged them and then Twittered to their friends about where to meet next. The mobile technology is completely invisible it’s like the air they breathe. One kid used his laptop to videoconference with his Dad who was on a business trip and gave him a “tour” of Maker Faire. They had scheduled it in Outlook, too!

On day two I saw an elderly couple with their walkers inch their way towards the Robogames arena to see the giant singing Tesla coil. The fellow stopped and his wife moved along until she realized he was frozen still, I saw this and was a worried — but before I could even react she shouted “what’s wrong” …. he hollered “COOL OVERLOAD” and then continued to advance.

There are thousands of stories that come out of Maker Faire like this, but the ones I think about the most are the ones that parents tell me — they bring their kids to these events and months later they are more interested in science and engineering than ever had been before. Dozens have told me that their high school age kids are going off to school to become technologists and scientists after they were “infected” with the “curiosity disease” at Maker Faire. None of us on the team are going to run for president or hold a political office; we’re not going to be able to pass any laws or get federal funding for all the challenges ahead but Maker Faire is our big bet. We’re a small team that works ourselves to exhaustion to spark minds. Everyone has a role they can play; everyone can do something to make the world a better place.

Here’s a slideshow of just a few of the photos I took, I hope you enjoy them as much as I enjoyed capturing little glimpses of Maker Faire.