Generous effort on the part of the 3DEA Pop-Up Store in NYC this December to help advise and encourage those who are looking to participate in Bloomberg’s Next Top Maker Challenge. Adafruit will participate later in the process by offering support to the Makers selected by this initiative from Mayor Bloomberg and the Economic Development Corporation.
The announcement from 3DEA:
Let’s cut right to the quick. If you’re an inventor and you haven’t started your submission to New York’s Next Top Makers competition, you’re either a procrastinator or you haven’t heard about it yet. Let’s review:
A) Procrastinators like to say they’re going to do things. They talk and talk and talk. And then when the deadline comes around, they talk and talk and talk about how they didn’t get around to doing anything. As “they” say, potential counts for nothing unless it’s realized.
B) New York’s Next Top Makers competition is a swift, friendly kick in local manufacturing’s pants. Sponsored by the Economic Development Corporation and NY Designs, Next Top Maker is looking for products that can make it in the rough-and-tumble commercial world. New York City’s quickly becoming the maker capital of the country – Shapeways opened the world’s biggest consumer-print factory in Long Island City, MakerBot opened up a shop and Maker Faire attracted a swell of fans.
NTM is offering a bounty of rewards to six competition finalists: $4,000 equipment and prototyping budget; five months of free studio space at NY Designs; $300 in Shapeways credit; technical support and mentorship from Adafruit Industries and Honeybee Robotics. Then, if you beat out the other five finalists, Next Top Makers is sending an $11,000 cash prize your way.
C) While the competition kicked off Nov. 13, there still hasn’t been one entry! See what I mean? Procrastinators!
At 3DEA, we’re staunchly anti-procrastination. Pop ups move too quickly to wait around for fictional signals like “the perfect time.” To help spur your hard-working innovation, Openhouse assembled an expert team of maker specialists until December 27. The 3DEA Advisory Team (pronounced 3AT or THREAT;) will provide you with product design, market research, social media, marketing, fabrication and materials consulting. 3DEA also reserved a Next Top Makers computer station at our pop up. Come in any time to work on your 3D rendering with our full suite of software. Print out a prototype of your product on our Ultimaker and UP!s. And, get a free online MAKE Mag when you submit, too.
No catch. No fine print. Let’s do it. Want to get a jump start? Email [email protected] and we’ll get you set up with some consulting. Otherwise, come by the 3DEA pop up at the Eventi Hotel, 835 6th Ave. + 29th St. #manhattankeeponmakingit
Every Thursday is #3dthursday here at Adafruit! The DIY 3D printing community has passion and dedication for making solid objects from digital models. Recently, we have noticed electronics projects integrated with 3D printed enclosures, brackets, and sculptures, so each Thursday we celebrate and highlight these bold pioneers!
Have you considered building a 3D project around an Arduino or other microcontroller? How about printing a bracket to mount your Raspberry Pi to the back of your HD monitor? And don’t forget the countless LED projects that are possible when you are modeling your projects in 3D!
The Adafruit Learning System has dozens of great tools to get you well on your way to creating incredible works of engineering, interactive art, and design with your 3D printer! If you’ve made a cool project that combines 3D printing and electronics, be sure to let us know, and we’ll feature it here!