6 talks on making electronics fun

Thanks to Chuck for sending in this post from the TED Blog

“I make paper interactive,” says Kate Stone in today’s talk, given at TED2013.

Because this description of her work “really confuses most people,” the best way to understand it is to see it in action. So in this talk, Stone demonstrates some of her very cool creations — like a poster that can pick the perfect slice of cake for you, a newspaper that plays audio and video snippets attached to stories, and a poster that changes its imagery to show you your energy usage levels. In the grand finale of the talk, Stone plays two paper DJ decks and a kit of drums embedded on a poster. It’s the last item that’s perhaps most thrilling: as Stone touches a cymbal or kick drum on the poster, it resounds through the theater. Stone has taken to Kickstarter to raise money to produce this for consumers.

All of these things were created with an ordinary printing press, printing conductive ink onto the paper and letting thousands of electrons flow through it. From there, all it takes is a small circuit board and wireless software to make it work.

“It’s not even about the technology,” says Stone, wrapping it up. “I just want to create great experiences.”

Below, find five more talks from speakers who similarly want to make electronic design a lot more fun.

Read more.


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