JustJon Online

Lego TARDIS

JustJon — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 13:00:46 +0000

Earlier this summer, I was trying to think of some new ideas to build for the upcoming BrickFair. At the same time, I was watching the new series of Doctor Who and the two ideas came together. An amalgam of the Doctor’s time travel device and the Lego bricks with a technological twist was the goal.

The prototype TARDIS panel

I based my design on the David Tennant Doctor and analyzed pictures of him with the TARDIS. After examining the pictures, the first step was to figure out a way to get the windows to look right. By laying out the white bricks with the studs on top wouldn’t allow the blue frame between the windows, so a different technique needed to be used. After talking to my friend Lee, I started working on a SNOT (Studs Not On Top) technique that would let me put the white bricks and blue plates sideways. After several tries, I found a technique that worked utilizing pins to hold the stacks in place, but then the lower blue sections needed to be repositioned to center them within the holes below the windows. I worked on a way to use jumper plates to center them in the holes in a satisfactory way.

The eight panels for the TARDIS

Once the panel was designed, eight of them were built in the proper blue color, unlike the prototype panel, and the framework was built to hold the panels in . This brought me to the phase where I wanted to add my usual technological flair. The three things I wanted to add to the TARDIS were flashing lights, a motor to open the door and a way to play the Doctor Who theme. The obvious solution to my concepts would be to use an Arduino Microcontroller to run everything.

Since the LED lighting was the easiest of the three, it was quickly added and tested to fade the lights in and out like they do when the TARDIS travels through time. The original concept was to run a bright white LED to the top and orange lighting inside. Unfortunately, the orange lighting couldn’t be seen very well in a lit room, but the white light on top was much brighter and it was the more important of the lights to me anyway.

I ordered and built a Wave Shield from Adafruit Industries to play the music. After hours of soldering and programming the Arduino, and spending several hours trying to work out an issue which turned out to be a problem with properly grounding the headphone jack, I was able to copy the Doctor Who theme from the David Tennant era in a wave format and play it with the hardware I had successfully prepared.

I spent quite a few hours working with a stepper motor and motor drivers, but to no avail. I spent quite a few hours trying to get the motor to play nice with the wave shield, but the power requirements for the motor and the power used by the wave shield caused too many issues. As the deadline to finish the project loomed, a decision had to be made, and I felt the music was more important to the project than the motor, so it was removed.

A lid was created to give the TARDIS a cookie jar aesthetic that would allow me easy access to the Arduino and to get better access to finish the inside of the TARDIS. Once it was completed, all that was left was to add the stickers for the Police Box and placard to the sides and test it out. The TARDIS plays the Doctor Who theme and flares the light on top in and out then waits a few minutes before repeating the process again while plugged in.

The TARDIS was a good experience in working with SNOT techniques for me and working with different power requirements for different hardware within the Arduino architecture. I am happy with the way it turned out and it was well received by those who saw it at BrickFair.

JustJon.Net WordPress Plugins

JustJon — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 13:00:03 +0000

I was recently talking to my friend Jaki, who pointed me to his blog post on must have WordPress plug-ins. I looked at his list and found it lacking in certain areas, and when I started mentioning plug-ins or types of plug-ins, he felt I should create a counter post. Rather than seeing what I thought were mandatory plug-ins, I felt it was better served to just show what I use on this site.

Many of these plug-ins have similar or comparable plug-ins of equal – or possibly better – quality, but these are the ones I’ve chosen to use over the course of the two years since I started this site. All of the plug-ins link to the developers’ sites, but can just as easily be installed from the WordPress control panel.

Akismet – When battling the scourge of spam comments, Akismet protects the blog with a shield that reduces the amount of spam that reaches the site and reduces time wasted dealing with it.
All In One SEO Pack – Increase your website’s visibility in search results by using this plug-in to improve your search rankings by featuring your keywords more prominently.
April’s Facebook Like Button – When Facebook opened up their site to allow you to Like any site on the internet, every site added them, and JustJon.Net is no different.
Audio Player – When I wanted to feature a clip from The Experience on Don Stugots on the site, I needed an audio player to do so. This was the player I chose to play the mp3 file.
Contact Form 7 – Rather than linking to an email address, a good site should use a contact form. This plug-in is highly configurable and easily reusable throughout the site.
FD Feedburner Plugin – RSS is a great way to get your website out there and allow users to subscribe to your content, but it is not easily tracked. Feedburner is a service that allows you to maintain and track people who subscribe to your site.
Google Analytics For WordPress – The WordPress Site Stats are good for tracking number of hits to the site, but Google Analytics give much greater depth and gives a better understanding of who comes to your site and what they do on it.
Google XML Sitemaps – An XML site map gives search engines an easy index to your website that will get your articles indexed and listed in Google, Yahoo, Bing, Ask and others much quicker.
Meebo Bar – The Meebo Bar allows users access to their instant messaging and an easy way to quickly share your content on their different social networks, including Twitter, Digg, Facebook and StumbleUpon.
Post Thumb Revisted – A plug-in to generate thumbnails from the images in the posts. This plug-in is used by my theme.
Post Thumb revisited template library – A second plug-in used by my theme to generate and display thumbnail images.
Post thumb widget – A plug-in used by my theme to display thumbnails on the front page of the site.
reCaptcha – A plug-in to reduce spam by requiring people (or bots) attempting to leave comments to be able to read words from an image.
Smart Archives Reloaded – It’s important to have an archive page to link to all your posts on a single page for both users and search engines.
TweetMeme Retweet Button – Adds a button to each page showing how many people have tweeted a link to the page and allow them to tweet it easily. This may soon be replaced by the button recently released by Twitter.
Twitter Widget – A plug-in to display my most recent tweets in the side of the site.
WordPress.com Stats – A simple stat page that shows visits and integrates into the WordPress Admin easily.
WP-Email – Adds a link to allow users to email a link to the post. Although the Meebo Bar allows this functionality, I like having it easily accessible at the top of the article.
WPTouch iPhone Theme – For users who view my site on an iPhone or iPod touch, it formats nicely in Safari on their iOS device.
Yet Another Related Posts Plugin – At the bottom of each post, up to five links to related articles are generated to entice users to view additional pages once they finish with the current article.

These are the plug-ins currently running on JustJon.Net to keep it running and displaying to users and search engines. If there are any plug-ins I don’t have but should or better versions of ones I do run, let me know below.

Anime Apps for the Droid

JustJon — Thu, 26 Aug 2010 13:00:52 +0000

Growing up, there were a few cartoons that were brought over from Japan and rebranded for American kids. We ate up Starblazers, Battle of the Planets and Voltron, unaware of its true origins overseas. With time, Japanese animation grew into its own and Sailor Moon, Pokemon, Dragonball, Naruto and their ilk grabbed the hearts and minds of a new generation of children, as well as their older counterparts who watched more adult oriented anime. Now, watching them isn’t limited just to the television, but to the Droid, Droid 2 and Droid X as well.

There are two kinds of anime apps, apps that play a selection of videos and single video apps. This list will be a mix of both, but may not cover every single app that is a single movie/tv episode. All of the apps below can be reached on androlib and can be easily installed by using Barcode Scanner to scan the QR code on the page.

Appleseed – If you like big guns and mecha battles, then you don’t want to miss this brilliant Masamune Shirow creation.
Ani.Me – An anime community and J-lifestyle app for the Droid phones.
Anime on Vuclip – Watch free anime videos and search for your favorites.
Speed Racer Episode 1 – One of the very first anime on American tv can be viewed directly on your phone. And if episode 1 isn’t enough, Speed Racer Episode 2 is also available.
Veoh – Although this is not an app, it is a streaming video website with a healthy amount of movies and tv episodes that can stream directly to your Droid, Droid 2 or Droid X.
YouTube – Sure, YouTube app comes preinstalled on Android devices, but there is a wealth of anime on YouTube that you can check out and stream to your handheld device.
ZooTopTen – An app that lets you stream the latest, most popular videos on ZooVision.com directly to your phone. Going to ZooVision.com forced the web browser to download the videos before watching, so this was a more convenient way to handle them. Zooropa also offers individual video apps for anime, like Lady Death, Twilight: UNBOUND (for Stephanie Meyer fans) and others. While ZooTopTen is free, the individual anime are not.

The one big advantage that the iPhone and iPad has over the Droid phones is the Crunchyroll app, which gives a huge select of anime to watch from the Crunchyroll website. The diversity of anime on the Droid will become more diverse in the near future when the announced Hulu Plus and Netflix finally come to the Droid. In the meantime, there is a good selection of anime to watch on your Droid, Droid 2 and Droid X phones.

Droid vs Droid 2 vs Droid X – Which Should You Buy?

JustJon — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 13:00:51 +0000

As the market becomes larger and there are more phones available, it becomes harder to decide which phone to purchase. Recently, my friend Jeff asked me to look into which phone he should get. It is a tough decision that many people who walk into the Verizon store face.

The chart below is an internal Verizon document released by Droid Life prior to the release of the Droid 2.

Verizon Android Comparison Chart (click to enlarge)

By viewing the chart above, the first thing we see is that the LG Ally is completely under powered compared to the other Verizon phones. The LG Ally has become a free with contract phone, but if you plan to do more than make phone calls and text messages, I’d recommend against this phone.

The Motorola Droid was the first major Android smartphone out of the gate from Verizon and soon enough was trumped by the Droid Incredible. While the Incredible had a better processor and camera, almost everything else was comparable between the two phones. The Incredible had slightly more RAM but the Droid had the slide out keyboard. Unless you prefer the hard keyboard, the phone of choice would be the Incredible between these two, but neither really stand up to the newer “super phones.”

The Droid X was released earlier this summer, with the Droid 2 released on its heels. The Droid X has a larger 4.3″ screen, 8 megapixel camera, 720p video capture and an HDMI out port compared to the Droid 2′s 3.7″ screen, 5 megapixel camera and DVD quality video capture, sans HDMI port. To the Droid 2′s advantage, it has an improved hard keyboard over the Droid with raised keys that replaced the directional switch with arrow buttons and slightly more memory than the Droid X. Both phones do have portrait and landscape virtual keyboards with Swype preinstalled.

So throwing all these details brings us down to the big question: Which phone should you buy? To me, it comes down to three key features: phone size, screen size and keyboard. If you must have the slide-out keyboard, the Droid 2 is the phone for you. The Droid X is a larger phone with a larger screen, which does lead to a larger virtual keyboard, but also does not fit into a pocket as easily. Personally, the Droid X suits my needs if I were to upgrade now, but each person is different and needs to find the phone that fits their requirements and their needs, since it becomes a daily companion that will be carried day in and day out.

Dating Apps For the Droid

JustJon — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 13:00:54 +0000

A friend of mine recently said the most common type of startup that people come up with is dating related. Since there is such a popularity for dating websites right now, why wouldn’t it carry over to the Android phones as well? That’s why I looked into dating apps for the Droid, Droid 2 and Droid X.

Different dating startups take different perspectives on dating and have different ways for you to meet that special someone. All of the apps below can be reached on androlib and can be easily installed by using Barcode Scanner to scan the QR code on the page.

ABlackBook – Need an app to keep you organized from all the dates you get with the other Droid dating apps? This will do the job for you!
Date Chat – A dating chat room on your Droid, Droid 2 or Droid X to chat with other singles live.
Dating – levelmatchcity helps you find the elegible singles around you with this application.
Dating Facts – Want interesting dating facts to share with friends? Then this is the app for you!
Dating Tips and Advice – Tips and articles for single guys looking to meet women.
Flirtomatic – Search over 2.5 million profiles to find Mr. or Mrs. right and start sending messages and gifts to open a dialog.
Match.com – Use the Match.com website? Then this app will help you extend your online dating from the desktop to your mobile device.
MeetMoi NOW – When you and another user are in proximity, you receive an alert and can begin flirting through this app
MiuMeet – Your phone’s GPS sees who is around you, shows you their profiles and you can start a conversation to see where it leads.
OkCupid – If you use the OkCupid free dating site, then this app will allow you to manage your account and flirt directly from your phone.
Purpll – The Android location based app to meet fellow gays, like Grindr for the Droid.
Skout – Another location based app to meet the people around you.
SpeedDate – Relive the speed dating scene from 40 Year Old Virgin without ever having to go to an event with this dating app.

Everyone’s special someone is out there, and with your Droid, Droid 2 or Droid X, your Android based phone or mobile device can help you find them or at least start flirting with them.

Recap: Damon Runyon Yankee Stadium 5K

JustJon — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 13:00:56 +0000

Me on the Yankee Stadium Jumbotron

This past Sunday, I decided to participate in my second 5K. The first was a run through the Bronx Zoo to raise money for Tigers, both at the zoo and in the wild, and the second run was through Yankee Stadium to support the Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation. While I knew how unconventional the course would be, I had no clue what it really would be like.

Unlike the Bronx Zoo, Yankee Stadium does not have any paths through which people could run. To deal with this, the organizers separated everyone into 14 different heats that would start 15 minutes apart. We were asked how fast we ran a mile when we applied so they could put us into an appropriate heat. Since my friends and I registered together as team GFY again, they pushed us to a later heat due to the slower members of our team. Personally, I applied saying I coud run an 8 minute mile, but with my continuing training, I was actually down to 7 by race day.

According to an email sent by the race organizers prior to the race, the course was as follows:

• START LINE on the 100 level concourse, near Section 120
• Run/walk two laps around the 100 level concourse
• After second lap, near Section 126, turn left at concessions, then take ramp to sub-zero level
• Run/walk through the sub-zero level
• Exit the sub-zero level between the Bullpen and Monument Park, turn right onto warning track
o Water stop located at entrance to/exit from warning track
• Run/walk two laps around the warning track that circles the field
• Exit warning track to the right, return to sub-zero level
• Run/walk back through sub-zero level, then turn left toward right field stairs
• Climb 103 steps to 200 level concourse
• Run/walk the length of the 200 level concourse toward left field stairs (near Section 234)
o Water stop located near Premio stand at Section 217
• Climb 64 steps to 300 level concourse
• Run/walk the length of the 300 level concourse
o Water stop located near Sections 330-331
• At Section 310, turn right down ramp near Gate 6, then take ramp down to the Great Hall
• Run/walk short distance through Great Hall (please stay to your right, course continues to Mile 2)
• Turn right up the Great Hall stairs to 200 level concourse
• Climb 55 steps to 200 level concourse
• Run/walk the length of the 200 level concourse toward left field stairs (near Section 234)
o Water stop located near Premio stand at Section 217
• Climb 64 steps to 300 level concourse
• Run/walk the length of the 300 level concourse
o Water stop located near Sections 330-331
• At Section 310, turn right down ramp near Gate 6, then take ramp down to the Great Hall
• Run/walk short distance through to FINISH LINE in Great Hall (please stay to your left to finish)

From the listing above it doesn’t seem so bad, but I hit a few snags with my run. When the air horn went off, I darted out and dodged through the crowd and got ahead of most of the people in my heat within the first half mile. It was soon me and a kid running around the bowels of Yankee Stadium until we turned a corner and the field opened up before us. The first time around the warning track, the two of us had the warning track to ourselves. The camera focused on us most of our time around the field and all the camera people were taking pictures of us with no one else to photograph. As we finished the first lap around, some of the slower people joined us, which made the second time around the warning track a little less pleasurable having to dodge and weave through them.

The other major obstacle came soon afterwards: stairs. Most of us who had trained to run the 5K did not train with stairs, since most races don’t have them. I tried running the first staircase, but quickly learned that would be a bad idea with the number of staircases I would be navigating in the second half of the run. Even after talking to people after the race, most of us agreed that the stairs were quite a hurdle that were tough to deal with.

According to my Nike+, I ran 3.72 miles in 27:49 with a pace of 7:29 per mile. The official time from the D-Tag on my sneaker that was tracked by the race organizers was 29:39.90 with an average mile of 8:55. Not my best time, but considering the stairs, ramps and people I think I did well. Knowing how unusual the course was, my goal was under 30 minutes, even though my best time on a 5K is 22:19 and my best mile is 6:42.

I consider this another successful race under my belt, and I am looking forward to my next race. At lunch afterwards with Team GFY, we were already plotting our next race and I’m looking forward to running again.

Lego and the Arduino Microcontroller

JustJon — Fri, 13 Aug 2010 13:00:07 +0000

In the 10 years of Lego robotics, it has come a long way. From the original RCX to the modern NXT, the things that can be created from these kit have become, far more advanced. Creating everything from walking robots to Great Ball Contraptions, people have created some amazing things, but what happens when people want to create beyond the limitations of the Lego Mindstorms?

When users hacked the original Mindstorms RCX, Lego embraced the hacker mentality and allowed them deeper access to hack the second generation NXT processor and worked with third party sensor developers to allow the expansion of Mindstorms beyond the original visions of the Lego developers. Sometimes, that isn’t enough and the creations can be expanding by forgoing the Mindstorms and embracing open source hardware, like the Arduino.

The Arduino is a form of open source hardware, where the Arduino is built and sold, but the schematics are freely published as well, so that anyone interested can build their own from scratch, if they are so inclined. This has led to the creation of different sizes or independent creations, like the Freeduino. The Mindstorms NXT brick is rather large and not conducive to small projects, but the Arduino Nano is a small board that at 1″ x 2″ can be embedded into much smaller projects.

The Arduino has more flexibility than the NXT. With 3 motor ports and 4 sensor ports, the NXT limits you to the number of connections, plus you are limited to the available sensors. Third party companies, like Hi Technic, expand on the available sensors, but the Arduino gives ground level access to the sensors. By having 20 input and output ports on the standard Arduino (and more on the Mega), you plug the sensors, motors, etc. directly into the processor and have direct access to them via the code. With a breadboard, the only limitation is the way the different ports are configured for input and output access.

With the usage of open source, the Arduino uses a variation of the C/C++ language that is able to directly address hardware via the language. For more in depth usage, libraries can easily be written or downloaded from sites online to expand the usage of the programs. By using C based notation, the learning curve is simple for most programmers.

Thanks to the opening of the NXT hardware, there is a variant of C available for Mindstorms, but requires the knowledge to flash the firmware to replace the language. Since the Arduino is also open, it gives similar opportunities to use alternate firmware to program it. This gives birth to programs such as the Netduino, a variant of Microsoft’s .Net that can be used to communicate with the Arduino hardware.

Programs for the Arduino in its native language have two required parts, the setup and the loop. The setup is where variables are setup, serial communications are opened and other functionality is prepared. The main processing is done in the area defined as the loop. Once the program is executed and the setup is processed, the loop continuously runs, and the processing within the loop via inputs, outputs, conditionals and data processing. As each loop iterates, it evaluates the conditions and reacts accordingly. For example, the code to the right initializes port 13 to be an output then alternates the power between high and low to cause an LED to blink at a regular interval the entire time the code is running.

The strongest addition to the Arduino are boards that connect to the microcontroller that are referred to as shields. They are often shipped as a bag of parts that require soldering skills to assemble. A user of one of these skills not only learns about soldering skills, but about the different parts that go into electronic devices. Many of the directions explain what things like transistors and capacitors are, how they work and how they need to be used in order to work properly. For instance, an LED will only work with electricity going through it in one direction to light up while a resistor can be inserted in either direction and still regulate the volage passing through it. Once the shields are built, they snap on top of the main Arduino and expand the capabilities of the Arduino to give it communications, sound, motors and other features that can be added on.

The one thing that the NXT can do that the Arduino can’t is to integrate with a Lego structure easily. While the Mindstorms brick with the processor has technic holes on the side, the Arduino hardware has no such convenience. The Arduino processor most either go in a Lego brick enclosure or use an adhesive (the bane of most Lego builders) to keep it in place. When planning a Lego sculpture that integrates Arduino, it’s important to keep processor placement in mind, including any shields, wiring and other add-ons used by the project.

The greatest feature that the Arduino has that cannot be matched by NXT is the level of communication Arduino can provide. The NXT allows you to connect to a PC or Mac via USB or to send messages to the PC, another Arduino or a cell phone via USB, but the Arduino can reach out far beyond that. Thanks to available shields and its open architecture, the Arduino can use the USB, Bluetooth, Ethernet, Wifi, XBee and more. This allows the Arduino to not just communicate with the devices around it, but to reach out directly to the internet to email, Twitter, send SMS, and any other potential ideas that you may have without a go between like a PC or cell phone.

Arduino brings a new aspect to Lego that would not have been possible otherwise. While it is not a replacement to all Mindstorms projects, it gives new possibilities thanks to it’s size, features and flexibility and can be used instead of or in conjunction with Mindstorms to create whole new experiences.

Must Have Apps For the Droid 2

JustJon — Thu, 12 Aug 2010 14:00:21 +0000

The successor to the Motorola Droid has been released with the Motorola Droid 2 and with it, the need to install new apps on a new phone. These are the apps I find the most useful for the Droid and in turn the most useful for the new Droid 2.

All of the apps below can be reached on androlib and can be easily installed by using Barcode Scanner to scan the QR code on the page. Most of the apps I use are free , so no cost is incurred downloading most of these applications.

Advanced Task Killer (ATK) – ATK is a great way to kill apps when not in use to free memory and save battery life.
Astro File Manager – An easy way to view the file and directory contents of the Droid
Barcode Scanner – When you come across a UPC or QR code and want to look it up, this is the best app for scanning and reading them.
Bump – A fun way to share contact information with people by bumping your phones together. The future of business cards.
Connectbot – SSH client to connect to remote servers.
DroidLight – For those times when you really need a flashlight, instead of using the screen to illuminate, use this app to turn on the LED flash on the back of the Droid.
Evernote – Stay organized by writing and syncing notes with the Evernote website and apps for desktop and other mobile devices.
Gesture Search – Search your contacts, apps and other items on your phone by launching this app and drawing letters on the screen. I find it to be a quick, easy way to look up contacts and prefer to use it over the Contacts app.
Google Goggles – A cool app that lets you take a picture and then scans the picture and runs searches based on it.
Google Sky Map – The app I always use to demo the phone. Run the app and point your phone at the sky to get an Augmented Reality view of the constellations overhead.
Key Ring – This great app scans the barcodes on your rewards cards (or any card with a barcode, like a gym membership), so you don’t have to carry the cards. When checking out, just hand the phone to the cashier and let her scan the UPC from the phone.
Kindle – For those times when you want to read and don’t have a book available, the Kindle app has a built-in bookstore and can whisper sync with your Kindle and other Kindle apps.
Last.fm – Streaming music app that creates radio stations based on what I regularly listen to thru iTunes or based on a band or song.
Layar Reality Browser – A variety of information can be seen by activating layers in this browser to gain all types of information around you.
Mother TED – Mother TED gives streaming access to every TED Talk released online, sorted by name, category, etc. and streams them to the phone in very clear audio and video.
Pandora Radio – A streaming music app, like Last.fm, that allows me to listen to radio stations based on a band or song I like.
Seesmic – A nice looking Twitter client that allows the monitoring and posting of tweets from multiple accounts.
Shazam – When I am listening to the radio or in a store and wonder what song I am hearing, I let Shazam give it a listen and it comes back and tells me who I hear.
Shop Savvy – When you are shopping and want to compare prices, scan the UPC barcode with this app and get prices from around the web and local brick and mortar stores to see where you can find it cheaper.
TV.com – Streaming access to clips to CBS and Showtime shows are how the app is promoted, but the real lure is the classic TV shows you can watch. MacGuyver, Beverly Hills 90210 (classic), Twin Peaks, Family Ties, and others to select from make this a worthy app to install.

This is just a small sampling of apps that are available for the Droid 2 and other Android phones. With the more powerful processor and better screen, the Droid 2 can successfully run all the apps available for the Droid and much more.

BrickFair 2010 Recap

JustJon — Wed, 11 Aug 2010 13:02:53 +0000

With the good time I had with my buddy Lee at BrickFair 2009, I decided I wanted to go back for the 2010 edition. Unfortunately for me, Lee took a new job and was unable to attend this year. Fortunately for him, that job was with Lego in Denmark and this was supposed to be his last weekend in New York. Instead, late in the evening Thursday, my friend Mike and I hit the road for some good ol’ Lego fun.

Day 1

At 2am Thursday night, Mike came by, we packed my things into the car and headed down to the Dulles Expo Center, right outside Washington, D.C. The five hour drive through darkness brought us to the convention center at 7am, as the event volunteers were setting up and organizing (which had begun the day before). My speaking at the convention later in the day got us access to start bringing our MOCs (My Own Creation, the term for custom built sculptures) and setting up them up in the proper areas. With our Lego items, removed from the car, Mike and I hit breakfast and returned in time for the rest of the exhibitors to join us.

My MOCs this year included a few from last year and a few new ones. They included Touristbot, a Green Lantern Power Battery, a TARDIS, the Chaotic Computer, the Castle Computer, the Android and some video game sprites. 10 MOCs in all to display to my fellow AFOLs (Adult Fans Of Lego) and the general public.

The number of attendees went up from last year, from 600 to 800, so there were plenty of new faces to meet to talk with. Friday is the relaxed day, where people find spaces, set up their MOCs and mingle. Assorted seminars occur, where people speak on different topics that may be of interest to fellow attendees. At 2pm, I spoke on Lego and the Arduino Microcontroller (a version of the talk will be on this site in the near future). The talk went pretty well except for one issue. I was told I would have a projector, which I didn’t have, so they went out and bought one, but someone borrowed the VGA cable and didn’t return it for my talk. Unfortunately, I had planned to use it to show different Arduinos, Arduino code and other related visuals. It impacted my talk because I couldn’t go as in depth as I had wanted to, but otherwise I thought it went well.

Once my talk was over, I went to hear Jamie Berard, a Lego designer who was originally from the US but works for Lego in Denmark, speak about what it is like to design Lego professionally and how their design process works. It was at this talk that the Tower Bridge set was announced for the first time anywhere. Following Jamie’s talk, we hung out for a bingo game whose prizes were some fairly high end Lego sets and then the opening ceremonies. The lead organizer, Todd Webb, welcomed attendees and gave us all information about the convention for an hour before Steve Witt of the Lego group held a Q&A. At this time, Mike and I decided it was time to check into our hotel, wash up and find dinner.

After a dinner of Chipotle, it was time to go to the Tyson’s Corner for the Running of the Bulls. The Running of the Bulls is a sale wherein Lego sells high end damaged sets to attendees for 50% off. This year, the rules were changed to be more organized. People were given a color code and shape and were organized according to them in a long line that went pretty fast once we were allowed to go in. The first time into the store, you were allowed one damaged item and that was it. The second time through the store, two damaged items, but you could purchase regular items off the shelves at a tiered discount. After the second round, Mike and I decided 40 hours awake was enough and headed back to the hotel instead of joining the third and fourth waves, the fourth of which only had 7 people.

My purchases that night included a Death Star™ in the first round and a Green Grocer and Motorized Walking AT-AT™ in the second round – in addition to a Pizza Planet Truck Rescue. The strangest part of the Running of the Bulls was the palettes of AT-ATs that seemed like there were more AT-ATs than attendees – to which an AFOL named Sabrina told me she started the AT-AT Adoption Society that night for all those homeless AT-ATs.

Day 2

After much needed sleep and a decent breakfast in the hotel, it was time to return to the convention center for the first of the two public days. Mike and I returned as the public were already filing in and I ran to start my projects and get Touristbot taking pictures. My sculptures were spread out and I ran back and forth checking on them, talking about them and keeping busy. It wasn’t until lunch that something happened. Mike and I walked out to grab some fast food with fellow attendees and were gone for about a half hour. When we returned to the convention center, we stopped off at the info desk to see what games would be running that evening and see which we wanted to sign up to play. As we’re talking, I look out and see a mother grab her son and smack him in front of Touristbot. Seeing this, I sprint across the 20-30 feet between the desk and the Mindstorms tables to see Touristbot’s head slumped over. The pins holding its head in place were bent and broken. Thanks to a fellow AFOL in the area, I was able to get a replacement pin and perform a triage and get him working again.

As 4:30pm came, I was glad to see the public attendees leave. It was time to relax, take an hour to decompress and hit the Yard Sale, where exhibitors were able to sell things in a flea market type setting in the cafe area of the convention center. Once that was done, Mike and I headed out to run some errands before Adult Swim. Adult Swim is when all attendees under 21 are removed from the convention center, and the adults can drink and relax without worrying about children in the area. In our efforts to get back in time for it and the Texas Hold ‘Em game, we didn’t get to pick up anything for dinner, so my drinking far outweighed the Oreo cookies I had for dinner. As for the poker games, I came in 10th in the “Lego game,” which was the game that was part of Brickfest that gave Lego prizes (I received a $3 set for my place), and came in in the middle of a buy in poker game that spontaneously occurred, but first place got the money and second got their buy-in back.

Once the convention center kicked us out at 2am, a group of us spent time in the green room in the hotel talking about the convention, shooting the shit and just chilling out before slowly dispersing back to our individual rooms.

Day 3

Our alcohol fueled lack of sleep had Mike and I rolling out late that morning, and upon finding out that we woke up too late for breakfast at the hotel, we hit the convention center for the second public day. Once I got my sculptures started, I noticed that Touristbot was not taking pictures properly. Upon examination, it seemed that after a year, parts of Touristbot were wearing down and needed to be repaired and replaced. I rearranged certain parts and moved the worn pins to places where it wouldn’t matter. It was some time after noon when Touristbot was up and running for the rest of the day.

As I was fixing Touristbot, my friend Miranda came by, so I got to spend time looking at the convention with her before heading to lunch with AFOLs again. On the recommendation of friends, I wanted to try Chic-Fil-A, but they are closed Sundays company wide, so it was not to be this trip. Once the fast food was consumed, it was back to the convention center to deal with the final hordes of the public. As 4:30pm hit, cleanup began and the breakdown of MOCs began. A solid hour of Lego and displays being disassembled until the closing ceremonies, where Todd once again addressed the crowd. He recapped the weekend and gave us the official statistics. 9,700 people came through on Saturday and 9,800 on Sunday, when added with the 800 exhibitors, there were over 20,000 attendees overall in the convention center that weekend, which was double the previous year. The sets The Lego Group displayed were again given away (this time I got a Space Police set) and it was time to pack up and go.

Mike and I joined a group of AFOLs for dinner at a local restaurant before hitting the road. Of course, we were having such a good time with everyone, we started out hours later than we had planned, but I was home and unpacked all my things from Mike’s truck by 3am.

Again, BrickFair was an enriching experience for me creatively, but it leaves me just wanting to create even more. Like last year, I am taking time off building to not get too burnt out from the rush before BrickFair. It does leave me looking forward to next year, where I am considering taking a more active part in organizing by volunteering to help out.

To see my pictures from the event, check out my BrickFair 2010 set on Flickr. And to see Touristbot’s pictures from BrickFair 2010, check out his collection on Flickr.

Is The Cell Phone Model Ready to Change?

JustJon — Fri, 06 Aug 2010 22:32:36 +0000

Cell phone carriers lock us into two year contracts as we purchase the hottest and coolest phones on the market. We follow the trends and get the most recent, most powerful phones on the market, but as we get more connected, the phones come out quicker and our phones become more outdated with increasing frequency and it leaves the buyer behind. With the quicker pace of new phones, is it time for the cell phone companies to adjust their model to allow the purchase of newer phones?

The first phone to throw this model on its ear was the iPhone. When Steve Jobs announced the first iPhone to great fanfare, people broke their contracts with other companies just to have it. It was the first time that people were really excited about a phone and it became the rare must have phone. Not only were people excited about it, but when the second iPhone was announced a year later, not only did more people jump to AT&T to get one, the people who got the first iPhone wanted to jump to the latest and greatest phone. It was a rarity for people to want to upgrade so quickly before then.

Google countered the iPhone with the Android operating system. While this kicked off a great smartphone war, it meant that any cellphone company could develop new phones without having to spend as much money developing the system software. The first Android phone wasn’t the revolution the iPhone was, but a year later introduced the Motorola Droid and the Google Nexus One, which kicked off the Android revolution. Six to eight months later introduced even more powerful phones, like the HTC Evo, Galaxy S and the Motorola Droid X. Bigger and better phones that out muscled phones that weren’t so old. Even Google conceded that the phones were coming fast and furious and retired the Nexus One after 8 months, admitting that their super phone was no longer the top phone on the market and stopped production of the formerly top phone.

With Android’s open operating system, manufacturers began releasing phones from the most basic to the most powerful, allowing anyone who just wants a phone and internet to get an Android phone, as well as power users to get a high end smartphone who don’t want Apple and/or AT&T. As such, the number of Android phones has overtaken the number of iPhones sold in second quarter of 2010. With the constant deluge of Android phones, people want to keep up with the top phones in their class and have the best they possibly can.

As phones come out better and faster, users want to keep up with the best. As the top phones upgrade every six months to a year, the contract based model needs to be changed. Users need the options they want in a timely fashion, to upgrade their phones as fast and effectively as any other device or appliance they own.