Limor Fried, who is known in tech-geek circles as Ladyada, is the founder of Adafruit, a company that creates electronics parts and kits. Part entrepreneur, part evangelist, she thinks we should all make the electronics we want in our lives, whether that’s an accessible interface for an aging parent or a computer-controlled light-up dress. She spends much of her time cultivating an online community of hobbyists, live-streaming her own projects. To Fried, engineering isn’t a job but a means of self-expression. Nicola Twilley, a contributor to newyorker.com, talks to Fried about the importance of D.I.Y. in the digital realm.
Stop breadboarding and soldering – start making immediately! Adafruit’s Circuit Playground is jam-packed with LEDs, sensors, buttons, alligator clip pads and more. Build projects with Circuit Playground in a few minutes with the drag-and-drop MakeCode programming site, learn computer science using the CS Discoveries class on code.org, jump into CircuitPython to learn Python and hardware together, or even use Arduino IDE. Circuit Playground Express is the newest and best Circuit Playground board, with support for MakeCode, CircuitPython, and Arduino. It has a powerful processor, 10 NeoPixels, mini speaker, InfraRed receive and transmit, two buttons, a switch, 14 alligator clip pads, and lots of sensors: capacitive touch, IR proximity, temperature, light, motion and sound. A whole wide world of electronics and coding is waiting for you, and it fits in the palm of your hand.
Have an amazing project to share? The Electronics Show and Tell with Google Hangouts On-Air is every Wednesday at 7:30pm ET! To join, head over to YouTube and check out the show’s live chat – we’ll post the link there.
