...that's from Singapore, (really?)
Yes.
Wow, very cool.
Okay. Well,
thank you for the warm welcome.
I don't want to talk too much
because I, you know,
I don't want to bore you with too much.
But I want to know a little bit more
about what you are doing.
It's very (easy) for me because
as William mentioned, you know
one day out of the (blue) he showed up
in the South of Switzerland
with the whole family
to come and attend the workshop
to learn about Arduino.
And it was very (interesting) for us
to see somebody coming from so far away
to learn this thing.
And also, I'm very – I'm very impressed
with the work that - that you have done
to kind of, you know, rally the makers
here in Singapore
and have a space like this.
And I think
it's also very interesting
that you are a teacher
by training, no?
And we will be discussing today about
how it is now important
to start teaching
this kind of stuff in school
because when I started working
on Arduino,
I was in a Master's degree for
– I was teaching in a Master's degree
for designers,
specifically Interaction Designers
so that the prototyping aspect
is very important.
And really
getting a functioning prototype
was a very important idea.
And I guess
when I was doing this,
it wasn't such
an obvious thing
like – like in Italy
where I come from
it's very famous for design,
but they tend
to do like
non-really functioning prototypes,
you know, they
there is no – there were no designers
kind of messing with electronics.
They didn't deal
with this kind of stuff.
While it was much more
of a Northern European idea
that designers should mess
with electronics,
and mechanics,
and you know, everything.
You know, they should be dealing -
kind of interested
in using these kind of tools.
And then we
kind of realized
that a lot of the tools -
there is an interesting thing
that happens
in the world of technology
that there is
a strange resistance
to make tools
that simplify the life
of grown-ups.
Now if you're trying
to make a tool for children,
everybody says,
“Oh yeah, children.
We need to make tools
to teach children how to code.
Everybody is trying to make robots
to teach kids how to code.”
And there’s like
a thousand of these robots
and they're all the same,
because teaching kids is good.
As soon as you say,
“I want to make it easier for adults
to understand about electronics.”
No. No, because grown ups
need to learn the right way,
which normally means
an incredibly old fashion way
way of teaching
that's very theoretical,
that nobody gets interested in.
And so it restricts
the number of people
that have access to these technologies.
Well, one of the ideas
that I was very - interested is -
to how – how do you create tools
that enable everyday people
to try to work
with electronics creatively.
There's also obviously
a bit of a political element to this
because if there – in the world
that we're living
is becoming completely digital.
You know, everything is digital now.
You do music with and with computers
you do cinema with computers,
we do a lot of things with computers.
And even like
the most classic activities are –
you know, yesterday I was crossing
border from Malaysia into Singapore
and we have to carry
a piece of electronics
into the country.
And the people I was with,
they've checked the customs
on a mobile phone.
They had a mobile app
to clear customs,
which for me is a “Wow.”
But l said like
totally 21st century, you know.
But if you cross it into the boarder
even if they pull out the piece of paper
that was printed in 1912,
and they have to pull out,
they stamp it notes,
you crossed the border
like you crossed the border
a hundred years before, you know.
So it's kind of – I said, “Wow.
This place is really, you know,
in the next century.”
I mean we are technically
in the 21st century,
but a lot of countries are still stucked
in the 20th century.
They haven't made the transition yet.
And so what I'm saying is that
if the world where we're living
everything is digital,
then who designs
the technology that we use?
Change is also the way that we live.
And so, if the number of people
who are participating in innovating,
in inventing things
is limited to a smaller
set of the population,
then it means that
a smaller group of people
decides how we live our digital life.
And since our digital life
and the real life is becoming,
you know, very- one thing,
then basically they decide
how we live our lives.
So clearly we need
a lot more people that are involved
in using technology creatively.
We need to teach –
we need to explain to people that
if you used electronic
as a creative tool,
it's not that you're
becoming an engineer,
it's a different thing, you know.
Being an engineer really requires
a little bit more training and
but inventing and doing creative work
with electronics doesn't require you
to do five years of
or three years of, you know, university.
You can learn something
without that kind of
you can build something
with less knowledge
with just enough
what you do invent something
to have ideas.
Also because a lot of the things
that I noticed is that
if you take a farmer
and the farmer explains his problems
to an engineer,
the engineer won't make something
that kind of works, you know,
because they'll be obviously smart,
very intelligent already.
But it will never be
the same as in the
as a farmer that comes up
with an idea because they understand
what it means to be a farmer
and they understand how to use
the technology to fix that.
And this applies to doctors for example.
So today I've met your
the Minister of
or the Foreign Affairs of Singapore,
and I was so shocked
because he's an Arduino user,
he knew everything about Arduino.
He was making a very difficult
technical questions about this.
I gave him as this WiFi board
as a present and we were like
we were debating like encryption keys
and power consumption and like
and I thought he was an engineer
and then I realized he's an eye doctor.
But then the neat idea is
if an eye doctor
understands technologies like
Arduino so well,
imagine what kind of innovation
he can bring to the world
of his profession of
being an eye doctor.
Then somebody else would
never be able to do.
So that's why I think that
making tools that make life simple
to people is something that
is very important
to really enable people to innovate.
And also I think
it's the work that we do as makers
doesn't stop at the
electronics or the software.
There's a lot of other things
that we do that are not
about electronics and software
that kind of enable people.
Like for example,
I used to go to the Maker Faire in the US.
And although there were like 100,000 people
at the Maker Faire in California,
I was kind of like, you know,
I was a privileged person
because my company paid for me to go to California
and there's a lot of people that would like to go
and see the Maker Faire in California,
but they don't have the money to go.
So, and I thought I need bring this
Maker Faire to Europe
but not just a mini-Maker Faire,
I need to bring the Maker Faire to Europe
that's like big and –
so I worked with a bunch of people
that enabled me to bring
the Maker Faire to Rome in Italy
and we've decided to organize
as a European Maker Faire.
And so this year we have 100,000 people
coming to see the Faire from all over Europe
but also people from China and India
came to see the Maker Faire in Rome.
And then we have 600 makers from 31 countries.
And even that does – doesn't have anything
to do with electronics,
I think it's also important
to create these occasions for people to meet,
to understand what they're doing, to exchange.
So this Maker Faire, which now is like -
was the third edition in Rome
already enable the bunch of people
to transform their ideas into companies.
So there was some kids
that showed up the first year
with like a prototype of a 3D printer.
And now they are one of the most
established 3D printer companies in Europe.
And so there was a lot of these things
that we saw happened.
So sometimes it's not about just the technology,
but it's also to create
events, places, situation, you know,
William was mentioning that
we created the first FabLab in Italy.
Because you know, I was
I went to the MIT a number of times
so I saw the first FabLab.
And then one day,
we were looking at the some of the government
to make it short story
asked me to organize something
for a specific event and that would be in Italy.
And it was supposed
to be something about the future of work.
So the Italian way to do this would have be
to take money from the government,
put some panels on the wall
and just put the money
in my pocket and walk away.
And then I said,
“No, that's not going to be it.
I'm not making an exhibition
about the future work,
which is a panels printed on the wall
like kids and again,
18, 20, you know.”
So let's try – so we've said,
“Let's first organize our work in FabLab.”
And we realized that
there were FabLabs here everywhere
including Afghanistan.
But there was no FabLab in Italy.
So I used the money for this exhibition
to create the first FabLab in Italy.
So in a week, you know,
creating the spaces, creating these events,
creating this opportunities is as important
as working on the technology.
So, you know,
as makers we kind of have this.
We make stuff
but we also kind of work with people
and help them, you know,
learn, you know,
make us learn from each other a lot.
So in a way,
you make stuff but you also have a mission,
to help other people and, you know, and it becomes
as so I think it's, you know, what we do
is can have impact, you know,
I've met a lot of makers in these years
I've been working on Arduino
and I have met people who have built medical devices
that solve, you know, farmers
– to solve problems for farmers in South America.
So there was a bunch of people that actually used this
technology to effectively, positively impact people's life
and I think this is possible.
If you call yourself a maker,
you kind of have to think that part of your
“job description” is to help other people in a way,
you know, with your knowledge or, you know,
by making by simpler or, you know,
organizing an event, organizing a space like this one
and stuff like that.
So this is kind of what, you know,
I like - of what happened when we worked on a tool
that was supposed to help the life of
physically 25 people because in the schools
where I teach the classes have 20 people – 25 people.
So we built the school 25 people and now
it has – funny enough, there's 25 million people,
visit the Arduino website at least once in a year,
which is kind of a multiply – they're multiplying
the effects that we create, you know.
There was imagined for – to help 25 people
and it's like 25 million people are kind of find
to figure out what are these or they're using these.
So I'm obviously, I'm super surprised about
what happened and it's kind of, I never thought
it was going to be this big, but, you know, I'm glad.
But I'm more also - to see those who are learning
about what you are doing and, you know,
how you will use this kind of tools of high,
you know, what it needs for you to be a maker,
what do you make?
And so, are you all Arduino users here?
Raise your hands so I can (looked).
Okay, that's very good. That's very good.
Do you know how – how many users
how many at home fix the user?
It's very difficult to estimate.
Actually yes. So from – I think
so what I meant is if you can – if you want to ask me
question, that's better to listen to your questions
than kind of talking to you is like a very – this
going on, and on, and on, and on.
So I'm more (interested) in what you have to say.
Now and then, the number of users that are probably
in community is very difficult to estimate
because obviously, you know, Raspberry Pi
has an easy job, therefore
they don't – they're the only one making this so they
know exactly how many there are.
But Arduino is kind of open-source,
so everybody is, you know,
either making their own ‘duinos or
buy the Arduinos for China or
something like that.
That's okay. But you know, it's open-source hardware,
as long as you don't call it Arduino, you can
do whatever you want.
So the – what can I say is that.
October 2015 or October 2016,
25 million people made at least
one visit to the Arduino website.
There was – then obviously,
this means there was somebody that showed up,
looked at the homepage and said “What is this bullshit?”
then scroll the browser.
And then people will spend maybe an hour.
The average visit duration on the
Arduino website is six minutes,
which for a website is a lot of time.
Because it means that if somebody
open the page and click this. So one second.
And somebody spent the whole afternoon
browsing through all the documentation,
like “Oh my god. What is this, you know.”
So there's a interesting,
you know, it means there is –
that the website is a tool that you use
to learn, to communicate to the forum,
has now many million messages posted on it.
And it's available in several different languages.
So most of the other thing that I
visit from – I think in the last year
that IDE was downloaded 11 million times.
But that's not a good indication
because the statistic say that
there is very few people connecting from China,
which is strange because when I go to China,
everybody is doing Arduino.
Then I realized is that
(inaudible) some Chinese Arduino communities
has sort of created their own Arduino website.
And so I guess a number of
people download the software
from a Chinese server that doesn't
go through our server.
So, we don't know exactly how many people
– it is interesting to see that in the first
week that we release a new version of the IDE.
We had maybe 2,000,000 to 3,000,000 downloads.
maybe about - sorry 1,700,000 in
the first like three to four days.
And this to me indicates what's kind of
a hardcore part of the community
is what we want for some million
people who are kind of using it,
you know, it's their main tool.
Then you'll never know,
because there are number of people who are still
stuck at Arduino 1.0.6
And they don't want to update,
which is kind of weird, you know, because it's
I don't know. It’s like you, you are – I don't know.
It's like those people who use
Word1.0 to write documents.
And they're like,
“Oh, I'm never upgrading. This is fantastic.”
Yeah like the romantic one. The romantic one.
Yeah, also they're crazy also.
Do you know the guy that writes Game of Thrones?
He writes everything on an
old 1980s computer
that's running probably maybe MS-DOS.
And everything is written on five inch floppy disks.
Like, you know, if one of those floppy disks
goes bad, you'll lose the whole
season of Game of Thrones, no?
Which I don't watch. So I don't care.
Perhaps maybe – maybe, you know,
maybe you're into that stuff
and you know and so your
future seasons of Game of Thrones are in
the hands of a five-inch floppy disk.
So some people are stuck in this
1.0.6 like World and like, okay.
So it's kind of a (they that simple).
Yes?
Just – I'm not a user yet.
I'm still waiting for – shipping the product.
Okay.
But I just noticed when I was
looking around for things like that or,
you know, that there are many other
– company is now trying to sort of
mimic what you’ve done.
Yes.
So I noticed Intel is coming out
with 4.12. Mm hmm.
What was your claim on that?
How do you see that impact or impact it more?
Well, the example of
– the Intel is a good example because
Intel is one of the very few
– a very, very few companies
who's said,
“We want to do something that's Arduino
compatible, so we're not going to be
“bad” people.
We're going to talk to you and work with you.”
Okay.
So they have that – Intel is
probably the company that's been
the most supportive and cooperative
and works with us officially
along with Samsung and Microsoft.
So, they're really going to work with us officially.
And then obviously it's open-source.
So anybody can just, you know,
use what we do.
And obviously it's sort of
becomes some kind of a standard.
So now even Boards that's got
nothing to do with Arduino,
they adopt the Arduino connectors.
So there was a company that made a
board that was called a “pcDuino”.
It wasn't running
- it wasn't running Arduino,
but it had these – with the Arduino connectors
because some people thought that they could
program (it in) Arduino and then I'm like,
“This is a Linux machine.”
Yeah. So it's –
although the Arduino name is
trademarked, the problem is that if you want
to really protect the trademark, you have to
spend a huge amount of money.
So,
we don't
want to spend our time protecting
trademarks.
Yes?
And then you.
Where did the name Arduino come from?
Okay. That's very interesting.
So the –
so basically, we came up
with Arduino a while, while –
I was working in this town
in the Northwest of Italy called the Ivrea.
And
in the year of 1000,
there was a guy named Arduino
that was born Ivrea
and he became the first king of Italy.
Obviously, he wasn't really the king of Italy
because back then nobody even knew
what was going on at the other side of Italy
because there was no internet so.
So, he’s kind of self-proclaimed king of Italy.
And then so the people of Imperia call
Arduino everything.
There is the Arduino Street,
the Arduino Square,
the Arduino Crane Company,
the Arduino Sports Car,
and there is also the Arduino bar.
So that's where I used to go get drinks.
I was like, when we have to find the name
for this thing I say,
“Yeah well, let's call it Arduino like the bar.”
And then, you know, later on we'll see how
– and later on, you know,
that was March 17, 2005
and then still
still
it's been called that.
Oh, yes, sorry.
I have two kids aged five and seven.
Okay.
And we watch on Ted Talk two or three years ago.
-Mm hmm. -And somebody ask doing the Ted Talk like
Can you give us some few fun projects?
And you mentioned a few back then
I remember that was somebody
had programmed the Arduino to make (inaudible).
Yeah.
And the kids love it.
And like since then
I don't know what else has been happening.
Can you think of anything that might be fun
-for the kids to look at that I can... -Wow.
…Google afterwards?
-Like anything about pets and animals, and all these things. -Yeah.
One of the exempt was the (sound) detector
if somebody who made the chair that tweets...
-When you fart. -Yeah.
That was an interesting project.
My son is five and my daughter is seven.
And they were the – make Arduino.
And like they (bare way of a great work things) to this lab.
Okay.
We were all playing around with little things.
-Mm hmm. -But I'm not
I'm not a creative person.
If you can suggest a few fun projects
-And it would be (inaudible). -You know, I just figure what could be a good idea.
Well actually
I mean, because it have to be strictly Arduino.
But for example, if you look at “Little Bits”.
They have raised this kit called “Little Bits.”
But they have electronic components
that you can snap together magnetically
They're designed for kids
and you can build some fun projects with it
and you don't need to do any programming or anything.
So, that's where – a good way to get kids started.
-(Little Bit junior). So like...
-they (have) a way of concept -Yeah.
-but I need to like create some concrete examples -Okay.
-of what can be done. -Yeah.
-And I'm running out of examples for... -Yeah. (I’m trying to understand).
Because normally somebody who's like seven is just
on the edge of being able to use Arduino.
Because, you know, using Arduino
requires you to understand written text.
And so normally
young kids don't – they're not necessarily
they don't understand written text
until they are probably, you know, seven years old
six or seven years old.
And so, I'm going to
at the moment I could have a very good idea.
One of the things that we
we've done now is that we made this board
and with Intel that is called the Arduino 101.
And kind of looks like that basic Arduino
but the processor is much more intelligent.
So a couple things it has is that
it has a motion sensor.
So, if you move around the board
it detects movement and it also has bluetooth low energy
So there is this guy the in the US
who wrote a software that turns all the movements you do
in the port into midi notes.
So if you have a computer
you can connect the Arduino to the computer
as a midi controller.
And so as you shake it in different ways
it make sounds.
So, we did a workshop for those ones
with that one and it was very funny because
by making modification to an existing code
that you could find online
then kids could just, you know, make different sounds.
And also on the computer
if you have a – do you have a MAC or...
If you have a MAC
you just need (Datatrend) which is free on the MAC.
-This is all good. -And essentially, you can associate that
to a specific musical instrument.
And then you basically play
by shaking, moving and, you know...
-It would be good for Christmas actually. -It's...
-That's a great idea. -kind of like cute application
that doesn't require you to actually deal any circuit.
And so, that one was a –
I use that in a workshop with the notes
And, you know, and they loved it
because it's just simple concept.
You have an existing software
you just make a few modifications
and you get different variations of these
and I think that's kind of funny.
I think everything that kind of makes sounds and music
tends to work.
Somebody years ago
build like an electronic drum set using Arduino
Again, they use like old CDs
and they glued this very simple sensor
(these piezo) sensors to that CD.
Then the Arduino
that's when you hit that particular old CD
and send a signal to the computer
which turns it into notes and plays the music.
And demonstration video was like, you know
looks like a one year old kid
with a drumstick going [drum sound]
and he totally love it.
It was – but the construction is simple
because you recycle old CDs, old mouse pads
or something and you build it
and becomes a drum set.
So, this kind of stuff
you can find online as projects to build, you know.
Another thing that I would recommend
is that there is a company in London
that sells those online called “Technology Will Save Us”.
And it started by
these friends of mine were very, very nice
very intelligent people
and they make a few kits for kids.
One is like
it's like a game console made with Arduino
but it displays an eight by eight (pixel thin) with
which is a very super low resolution console
and you play few video games.
Another one is a kit
that helps you take care of a plant
so you can connect sensors into the plant.
And the third kit is a theremin.
So it's a musical instrument.
You move the hands near the
the Arduino it only makes different kind of sounds.
But it's a nice –
probably because you buy the kit.
The instructions are very simple
and in one day you can assemble it with your kids
and they play with it.
So it's kind of a, you know, it teaches kids
about the fact that you can actually build your own toys
which a lot of kids
are kind of lost this idea to build your own.
You have fun with this stuff
that you make yourself, you know.
Oh, yes?
So we're actually doing a sort of
visual interface for Arduino.
-Okay. -And all we have is that
you know, a different laptops
you know, a the different – (libraries you need to use).
So as you can help bringing all those up in the (server)
and sort of compile over the Cloud
you know, through that.
We want to know whether there's any licensing issue
that I should be aware of and then putting it all online
and putting all the libraries
-and all the different (inaudible). -So as long as you don't call it “Arduino”.
I mean if you call it arduino.sg
clearly that's a problem.
But, you know, actually so
a few months ago
we launched an online version of our IDE.
-Yes. -It’s called “Create”.
And as of point
we have in the
in the list of things we want to do.
We have also a scratch-like interface.
But – so we also produced
the software called “Arduino-Builder”.
You should look it up – look it up – you look it up
it's “Arduino-Builder”.
So basically, we took out
all of the compilation part of the regular IDE
and we put it into a common line tool.
So if you use that one
to compile the code
it is exactly the same code
that comes out of the Arduino IDE.
So – and you can put that in the Cloud
and the license is very
I mean if you make improvement or modification
you should share it back but you can
then put it on a server and use it.
That one gives you the ability to be (compile).
So you get the same exact code as the Arduino IDE.
And also we add these features that make it easier
for Arduino to find where your libraries are
so that some parts of the compilation
are better automated now.
So including other libraries
you know, other codes need some libraries
and obviously so I'm not sure
if including those libraries will expose any other...
No, if you
I think normally if you put the libraries on the server
in whatever format
as long as when people download it
they understand that this library is from Adafruit
they made it and that you're not claiming
to own anything
but yeah, the library is GPL
so you need to basically provide people
with a link to say where you downloaded it from.
So that they know that this is an Adafruit product.
Adafruit is happy if you use their code.
They don’t complain.
They only get upset where
there has been a number of situation where, you know
Adafruit are really good because they make
hundreds of libraries
And then they called them “Adafruit_something”.
So that people understand
that they have to thank Adafruit
for their work.
And there's a number of people who download it.
They removed that “Adafruit_”,
they maybe modified couple of lines
and then they put it out as their own library.
So they kind of take away
the credit from Adafruit which is, no
not nice.
-But if you don't do that, then you’re okay. -Very nice.
Very nice.So basically, most of the audience were all
they knew all about Arduino.
So who – do you use also Arduino in your profession?
-Is anybody were using it as a profession? -Yeah.
Can I – can you show me the hands?
Oh wow, that's nice.
So, what do you build with Arduino?
Not me, my staff.
-All we did was -Okay.
we connected the dissolved oxygen sensor
-with Arduino -Okay.
and tied it up to a actuator to turn on an aerator
Okay.
so we put them on fish ponds and prevents fish kills
-from lack of oxygen. -Wow.
Very cool. Nice.
Any other application that you build
that somebody wants to talk about?
-Yes. -I got a intern at home
and starting in 9th of January.
-I used to work with Raspberry Pi. -Okay.
And probably not – when it comes to (storage menu),
so I want them to work on sensor.
(May I call this sensor)?
-Yeah. -Like it (with) a drone.
-Oh, wow. -And so we can start mapping the air quality in cities.
Oh, wow. Yeah that's... -So with the – I'm not an expert in Arduino.
So, maybe you got some tips whereas like
where would you actually start?
Well, effectively almost
any Arduino would work
because you just need to store the data somewhere.
We're about to launch a board which is kind of like this
small and it's just the same processor
that we have in Arduino 0 which is a 32 bit
ARM processor and it also has a
micro-SD protector.
So you put a micro-SD. You protect the sensor
and when it flies around,
you download the position.
And the value from the sensor, you store it in the SD card
and when the drone comes back, hopefully.
You take out the SD card
and you get a CSV file to download.
So to build that code is very simple
and essentially this was designed for
this kind of activity.
Well, it's going to be called “MKR zero”.
Are you broadcasting this?
-Yes. No. (inaudible) – that's catchy.
Yeah, there's going to be a border or in a (Adafruit makes)
-King size SD card. -As we go – try to – yeah, it's kind of similar.
-Question. -Yes.
I have a question from my friends.
They're asking,
“What's the most impactful Arduino project
-that you've encountered so far?” -Oh wow.
Yeah. That's a difficult question.
I should prepare for this question like every month I decide.
It's very difficult because every time I feel that
we found something that's very impactful
then somebody comes up with
something else that's crazier.
And I don't know. To me it's very interesting to see
for example, if you look at the open source 3D printers,
including the major (board).
They all kind of started of with the Arduino
as there hardware platform
and the work that is – a lot of people hae done
using Arduino to understand
how to control motion in these kind of machines
has generated a body of knowledge
that gets used in rebreathers and people
made sealing machine based on the same idea.
People made open source laser cutters.
People may even – cake decoration robots with that.
Somebody made a machine that tattoos
your – our wrist.
Like you put your wrist – your arm inside
and it tattoos stuff on your arm.
And it's interesting because this is all based
on this very interesting phenomena
this layering of technology.
So we in a way simplify
the access to electronics and software
and then somebody start building something
that was called “motion control”
and they work is equal to Grbl
which is like a software that takes G-code,
they are using – (skills) the machines
and controls the stepper motor.
And then on top of that, people started
to create all the different things
and they could – this thing called “RAMPS”.
This shield that a lot of 3D printers used RAMPS.
And then that particular
combination of Arduino
mega plus RAMPS, steam power
like a ton of printers.
And so it's interesting, you know this, you know,
people understand and they build
and somebody else comes and builds on top of that.
And then now we have
a lot of these 3D printers
that are enabled by the work that
people have done, you know, by collaborating
in different ways.
So I think that's broad enough,
you know, like a
crazy lifesaving project
but it's – to me it's very important because
it shows that, you know,
if you work together you could kind of
create – you can create
a body of knowledge that becomes useful.
So if somebody want to build
some kind of a machine with
an x, y, z axis machine.
A little bit like a 3D printer.
They don't start from zero.
They can create that
and build something with it.
And doing that, it's kind of knowledge
is an important, you know, tool.
Then obviously, you know, people have built
machines to analyze the DNA
and then build a machines that can
incubators for kids in
and people have build, you know, tools for
people that cannot speak, also they can, you know.
At the Maker Faire this year,
somebody build a glove
for people that cannot speak
so they can use sign language
but then the Arduino – store gigabyte from Arduino
that understands the signs
and uses the mobile phone to speak the words.
So if somebody cannot speak
they can sign and the phone (cannot) speak
which enables people to use
sign language with people
who don't understands sign language.
I think it's a very important innovation.
And so we gave it – we give this project
100,000 euro as a price at the Maker Faire.
But this type of project was
somebody made a sensor that allows
blind people to go on bicycles.
Yeah. It was kind of – (like a thesis).
It allows blind people to participate in bicycle race.
-Wow. -So they have a special three-wheel bicycle
and this sensor has a bunch of
sensors that detect obstacles
and so the person who rides the bike
and the sensor tells
person if there are obstacles around and they just race.
So they gave it with the school.
They could have blind people race in the paralympics.
There was another group that
build a video game for dogs.
A video game for dogs.
It's essentially a box
with three buttons.
And it releases these biscuits for dogs.
So the dogs sees a a light on,
they go – they (keep) with their, you know,
paw and they get a...(cookie)
And then the more they learn how to do
this, the more their gain
becomes complicated.
So the dog has to kind of go all
the sequences and everything.
And apparently, it keeps the dogs busy
while their bored.
And they are happy.
So there was industry
installation of this kind of projects and
every year there's – weren't more.
So it's kind of hard to...
Yes.
I have a question.
So as you mention the Arduino 101 just now.
-Yeah -And meanwhile, (called out) Arduino 101
which is on internet (and how can we)
has a potential for of (mesh network)
-Oh yeah. -And I'm wondering when
we're to expect Arduino of having
his time neural network speed.
Yeah. Actually you can use it now.
There is a thing called the
“The Intel Pattern Matching Library”
you can build it.
Intel is not really great at explaining
to people how cool is the product
into – because with this name nobody
would – it's a pattern matching library.
So basically, what happens is that
in the silicon, there is
essentially a neural network implemented
there are some neurons implemented in silicon.
So the idea is that,
you can either train
the neural network directly in the
Arduino 101 if have seen – whole
learning process that you want to do,
or if you want to work
on more complex stuff.
You should get the data
use some kind of a software to train
the neuron and then you download
the information in the network.
But essentially the idea is
more of the potential use.
They use – you connect sensor to this
network and the network can
basically interpret the data from
sensors even if the processor is off.
So for example, if you are
making like a fitness band
like FitBit, the Neural network can
use that accelerometer the board
has a 6-axis sensor.
You can interpret the data.
You can understand that
there was a step,
or somebody who's running, or we’re going up the stairs.
So – and then you count data
but you wake up, the processor
just say “He took a step” turn off
or “she was running for two steps”, stop.
So by doing this, you can save
dramatically the power
and also this kind of motion
a construction algorithm.
They tend to be very, very expensive.
They're not open source.
So if you train network to do it for you
(it's turning off).
You get better quality with the
not having to license those things.
And at the moment
the examples that you find are mostly inside
you press the button,
you shade the board
and the board learnsthat movement.
Every time you do that movement.
it pauses – “oh, you do a movement.”
So the examples are not exactly
exciting but they show you
that there's a lot of potential in that thing.
Westworld. I know you don't watch TV but...
-Sorry? -Westworld.
-Yeah. -Oh, yeah.
-You've seen this? -Westworld.
I don't know. Westworld. All right.
The neural network is not powerful enough
to create this sentient being
actually, what is the last episode,
-it's like this week. -Ninth season.
-Season 9. -Ninth season.
Okay. Yes. I was waiting
for the last episode.
Yeah, I know it's not enough
to create – it's normally I think equivalent of
the brain of a tiny insect
tiny insect but still you can create to do some useful stuff.
And mostly, you know, you can do it
optimizing the power, or
optimizing the computing capability.
So that processor has a lot
of features in there.
Is anybody here a teacher like William?
Have you ever taught an Arduino
workshop for somebody else?
Okay, good, good, good.
Have you ever taught Arduino to kids?
Oh, wow. Okay. That's great.
Because you know, it's not
it's not always easy now to teach kids
because they feel like super excited
or you kind of like keep
them focused, you know.
You have – did you have a
did you have a teacher that doing to kids?
What age?
The youngest was my son.
Okay, that's four.
Arduino, for like a four-year old.
Yeah. He looks at the printing and
(how we do things). Okay.
They understand the hardware.
Yeah. I think – I know you're more
thinking about the coding parts
but they're doing the hardware, no problem.
(Mike) is good and faster than I do.
Wow. I think one frequent asked question
which I always get from teachers
You hold it.
Yeah. One of the frequent asked
questions that I always get,
not only as a teacher
but from teachers would be,
“Yeah, all this Arduino is cool,
but what has that ever do with education?
What has that got to do with..."
You know, I don't say
– or my kids are young
or we are from the (Arts stream), you know.
What does this have
to do with (Arts)?
Well, when you hear this
kind of remarks,
what would you say to them?
Oh, wow.
Well, the funny thing is that
sometimes you hear people say
that people who are technically
oriented to technology,
they don't really like the (Arts).
But I have to say
that sometimes people who are into (Arts),
they are little bit, you know,
they kind of – they don't
they're not – they don't say,
you know, kind of – in a way,
they're also the one's
who don't understand that technologies.
You know, it goes “Creative”
– a community.
And a lot of (arts)
is done now with technology.
Like contemporary art's
are using computers,
they're using electronics.
One of the first community
to adopt Arduino
after my students were musicians,
building new interfaces for
– there was even a
conference school,
New Interfaces for Musical Expression.
So, you know,
and then it would be at a
bunch of stuff using things
like Arduino.
And a lot of the current
interactive installation define
from artist are built using
, you know, technology.
A lot of exhibitions
in museums are Arduino.
Even the New York Times
wrote an article like five years ago
saying that if you used an Arduino,
you could build installations
for museums that would
, you know, be cheap and
- so one of the things
that I think is very interesting
that's happening right now,
is that if you use something
like Arduino to teacher.
For example you can
– you can do use
a lot of technology
that you have all in the same place.
But a lot of teaching unfortunately
is still divided by subjects.
So you do things in Arts,
and then you do Math,
and then you do Literature,
and then you do
– and you do is like all
, you know, we called it (silos), sometimes.
They're separated, you know.
While if you are building
a project using Arduino,
you might need to put together
some of your understanding
on Physics
because you're trying to make
some to evolve, you know.
I was once I was trying
to build some kind of a
a robotic armor,
to draw something on paper
and I realized that,
oh wow, now I have to
remember all those (Economics)
with formulas that I always hated
when I was a student.
Why did I hate them?
Because people, thought me
those (Economics) with formula
without ever explaining to me
why would I need them.
And then I have
the problem that
I have an XY coordinate
and I have to turn it in
two and three angles.
I said, “Oh, take a moment
(inaudible).”
So in a way this kind of project-based
learning with learning by doing.
And as if I have to say
you put together all your knowledge
and then suddenly you move
from one – visibly
go now so you find your ways kind of
a toy that uses Physics
and then uses Music.
Then you need to produce sound
from them to hear.
Oh, I need to make a sound.
So I need to know about frequency
and I need to know about notes.
I need to know about echo
and all these kind of things.
So, suddenly all you - things you learned
in Music they go into
your project.
So building projects with this
kind of technology in my opinion,
is very powerful
because it teaches kids.
And when you're trying
to solve the problem
you bring in everything
you know about life.
That's why for example say
the farmer learning about Arduino.
Because in a way,
they bring some life skills
about that subject that
unless you're also a farmer you don't know.
All you have do is ask.
Sorry?
Hi sir, my name is (Gabrielle).
So I teach a robotics
at school music and (inaudible).
Okay.
And later they (inaudible).
So the thing now is a lot of student
are very excited to use
(scratch programming)
Yeah.
But the thing is a lot of students
want to learn (syntax),
but the school teachers do not allow
their students to learn (syntax).
So what do you think
could do that experience teach
to learn syntax building? That's it.
Well, mm mhmm.
I mean (Scratch) is really good
to teach your young kid.
You get going very quickly.
But then obviously there is
a point where
if you become an expert
there's also personal productivity.
So if you're an expert,
(but they used I don't) want to
– and you know that as we
the big people who have built tools
for Arduino where
– even the (aim) of tool
shows you the Arduino code
generated us.
So that one is a good idea
because once you build the project
you kind of stop
because it's too complicated,
then you generate the code.
You cut it and paste it to Arduino
and you could (ping).
And then kind of, you know,
then it keeps getting mapped
the blocks to the code.
But you need to get to the point
that they are trying to do something,
that they cannot do
with visual tool
and then they are motivated.
Even with the adults it's like,
when I started teaching,
the first lectures I did it
in a way I saw people teaching in university.
So started teaching people about electricity,
electrons, current, atoms.
And then everybody was, you know,
getting distracted.
They would browse a data
and make it a wifi.
I said, “Oh, wow”.
Even I turned off the wifi
or I become a different teacher.
So, I said this was the second option.
And I realized that, you know,
when I was kid I learned
by doing things.
And when I started learning
what all the (gist) as a kid
was the moment something
I was trying to do, required me
to learn about knowledge.
So in that particular context,
that piece of knowledge connected with
my situation and I was open
to that concept.
But if I try to learn
a bunch of things completely
in abstraction with no connection
with my life,
what's the point of this knowledge?
It goes away.
So, if the kids get to the point
that they want to do something,
but they can't do it
because the visual tool cannot do it,
in that moment they are
ready to invest the energy
to move to their (level).
Yes?
If you had to put Arduino
and all of these maker community
in one sentence to someone
who never heard it before?
Oh, wow.
Because a lot of people ask me
this about what is it
I can't define this?
Well, the reason of usual definition of making,
which is kind of boring.
It is difficult to create
like a simple one sentence definition
also because I noticed
that even in the maker of community
a lot of people have a different
way to think about it.
To me the important part, is that
– it is in a way a movement
that is connected only with
essentially a DIY attitude,
so do it yourself attitude,
which it's essentially
a technological extension
of the DIY community,
which in a way is
- uses different, you know,
learning by doing
and this kind of constructing
a little bit too technicality's term.
But in education this makers
are called constructive in term,
– you build up your knowledge.
But in way, so it is essentially,
it's a DIY community
that embraces every activity
with a technological angle.
So they used digital technologies
The people who do this are not necessarily
an expert training at field
of technology
They may be somebody that's been speaking at other
technology and they used
and in the field they used technology
and they do a lot of learning by doing,
learning by making projects.
So it's the hands on learning and a deep
another aspect that makes maker different from
other previous communities
that it’s learning from other people.
It's also called peer to peer learning.
It happens because makers use internet.
They communicate with people.
A number of makers that's making complex concepts
to learn them with a lot of pain
and then wrote articles online to explain them
in a different language,
making it easier for other people to do that.
And so, I don't know, I should - I think
I should sit down and probably try come up
with a very elegant phrase to say this.
At the moment, I don't.
There's a couple of people who has,
a couple different publishers who've asked me to write
a book about makers.
But then it would require me to go, all this kind of thinking
and come up with clever definitions
or intelligent ideas.
And so sometimes, yes, kind of.
I'll just give you an example I think, you know,
when I started working on microcontrollers
before I made Arduino,
I was working with teachers because, you know,
before I started teaching
I was working in a – I was working
and I was doing software for a long, long time.
And then I was working in investment fund,
in a venture capital fund.
And after that okay, this is not for me.
I don't like this.
I want to go to something
that has got something to do with, you know,
maybe something and maybe helping people
so I started teaching in the school.
That's why I used (pictures)
because they were - they're very
the most easy one to find on the market,
because Italian's were using the pictures
to hack satellite tv's.
So they can watch their – the football game.
So they – you could buy them anywhere from.
But then after a while,
we found a lot of limitation in the (pictures).
And we want something that would have a good
free open-source C compiler
and in the end we ended up using the AVR
because one of my
(in a way) mentors, yes, (inaudible) told me
I'm going to look at the AVR,
but at least the reason why we ended up using it,
is because the old community,
which was not called makers back then
who read all their AVR documentation
which wasn’t clearly written
digested it and they wrote their own articles,
they explained the same stuff
in the language that humans would understand.
So we started to work with AVR's, for
also for that reason
because the documentation was, you know,
unable - in a format
that wasn't an official datasheets
but also articles like people
explaining how to do this.
So I think in a way, you know,
this is a community
that were kind of helping each other
kind of part of the - the sharing
is part of the package.
(Inaudible), is someone who is
hoping to go beyond other than looking
to the (inaudible) besides the services like
easy work or rather
a relatively easier introduction into (inaudible).
Yeah, by using Arduino you said that
-that the development. -Yeah, but like beyond
(inaudible) coding and (inaudible).
(For you), when you use Arduino, you're doing C++.
So, the question is that,
unfortunately there's a bunch of people
who called themselves professional developers
where not all of them
are professionals but some of them
called themselves professional.
There is this (fellow) Arduino is not a real
thing so you're not doing (embedded).
You're doing an (embedded) it's C++.
So you can actually take it
out of the Arduino IDM, and use
the common language you want.
And there's a bunch of people that use Arduino
to build actual products.
Somebody even wrote an article that a few
maybe a year ago saying that
they will use an Arduino in industrial equipment.
And they thought that was (functioning)
and the people should stop
in a way considering Arduino,
just as for providing to,
because it's kind of stable.
And one of the advantage of Arduino
gives you is that
its productivity.
It was easy
because this company (Siemens) made this
small industrial computer that's
based on the Intel Galileo
and they give the documentation,
so it shows you how to use the official
Intel IDE for this processor.
And the set up
setting up with development environment
takes the first 20 pages of
the manual, 20 pages
of like hard core C language -- literally
Option B. You take a USB cable.
You plug it in this thing.
You download Arduino.
You select Intel Galileo Generation 2.
Select the blink. Press the button,
30 seconds later there it is - easy.
So the instructions you can write them
in a fortune cookie in a Chinese restaurant.
Snap it and then
the instructions are on the fortune cookie, you know.
So to me that was very important
because I know a lot of people
who develop software
they goes in to industries.
They run companies
and they have been here doing software
in different ways and they will have
a lot of – they would waste a lot of time,
trying to learn and try to development
many kind of, you know, old style.
While Arduino allows them
to be productive today, you know.
So one of the things,
obviously you want to do is,
because I'm talking at the arm
based Arduinos or the Intel based Arduino,
because they are more powerful.
Also the industry thing is that,
if you start with Arduino and you make an (inaudible).
If you look at the place
where you keep your sketch,
Arduino converts the code into
full blown C++
and then compiles it.
And you can even keep the assembly language
that was compiled.
So if you want, you can use the Arduino code
to see from the function
to the binary.
And then you can open the source code
and go those are DigitalWrite.
Okay, good. Let's look at
what DigitalWrite does.
And by looking at the source code,
you can then go back and understand
every single thing that's happening
to the code down
to the (metal),
which is something that you might not
be able to do without tools because
they don't know the source or
the source is insane.
This may go back in median files.
So in a lot of schools, they use
Arduino to teach and make the development
because if you look at the (APIs),
the code is so steeple
that a bachelor student
can learn everything in a few days
from high level to
what happens in the processors.
So, I think you can make more comp
make use of more complex Arduino
where you can use Arduino in a way to
move to more complicated.
Oh, question?
Hi, (I'm Donna). I'm living in here.
I guess my question is,
do you have anything to say
to people who do not appreciate
the open source culture as much?
Well,
I think the people who don't appreciate
the open source culture
are becoming less and less.
And the biggest example to me
is Microsoft.
So Microsoft used to be
officially from the Excel side
their worst enemy of open source.
That is the famous Halloween (memo)
that Gates wrote that's like it makes
the history of open source.
And now, I worked with Microsoft.
They are completely different.
Now they completely
they are so sold on their open source concept
that they say, to me they're now they are
in open source company.
They are then selecting big sites
to protect the source code.
Before there were a proprietary company,
selectively releasing.
They even shutdown the open source
group they had because now,
they don't need a separate open source code.
Every team
I worked with, releases code.
They release the code for everything,
you know, for .net or - so in a way
that's obviously they don't release
the code for everything.
But they're, you know, they made
a huge transformation because
this thing, the multiplication,
the value multiplies with the open source.
Last year we participated
in a study that people were making
about Internet of Things developers.
And this survey
was like a worldwide survey
of thousands of developers.
And they estimated that there were
4.5 million people in the world that defined themselves
as IoT developers
And they defined it,
around 80% of them says that,
either they would only work with open source
or they only work with open source tools
or they even, you know,
imagine to open source part of their technology.
So in a way right now,
any say company knows that
in order to convince developers
to use your technology,
you have to make the open source.
Even in US to make the (inaudible) knowledge
of (inaudible) so back in the days
like there was this company
Broadcom that was making this Wi-Fi module
that were (inaudible), you know.
Probably some of the best Wi-Fi chips
but in documentation it was impossible to get.
Then they sold this kind of
(inaudible) to Cypress
and one of the first thing the Cypress gave was to
open all the documentation and put (your light).
And, you know, openness of information
open source
clearly multiplies the value of
whatever you call it.
If you are doing
and
I think there's less and less people
they can defend
not to be the open source.
Clearly there are situations when you should keep some code,
not open.
Because I – we have to be
an expert and admit that open source community
it is not always
not always everybody plays
a fair game.
There's a lot of people that
there are basically
they take from the open source community
but they don't give anything back.
Like the people who are making this
you know, compatible Arduino boards.
And they're making
hundreds of thousands of them.
They are using all the work that we did
and they don't contribute anything back.
And if you email them and say,
“Okay, you're copying Arduino."
"Can you at least put the files"
"for the board online?”
Sometimes there are even provide to you,
sometimes they'll tell you, you know, get lost.
So clearly there is a problem right now
in the open source world that
there's a lot of people that are more playing safe.
They are taking from all of us,
they're also taking money
but they're not either giving back
(software) work
or they're not giving back money.
So that's one issue we have in that open source world right now
is to remind people that open source work
if we both share.
If only one shares and the other one write
I mean, or cashes the money,
you know,
it doesn't work.
Yes?
I'd like to know the role of Arduino right?
I mean, today is okay,
you don't really (weary) where you started
from the time of graduating
or studying something happening
became dream of people in the night?
No, no. It took many, many years.
At the beginning I think,
me and my co-founder David Cuartielles,
we put the grand total of 700 euros,
which will probably like a thousand dollar
to buy one
a few - 300 PCBs
that people could use to assemble their own Arduino.
And then
after while we kind of have
some money together to build 100 USB Arduinos fully mounted
and it was very (slow) at the beginning,
you know, it's slowly.
We spent a lot of time explaining to people
what Arduino was
and so it was very gradual.
So I remember that in 2006
when we sold the first 10,000 Arduino,
made an – wrote an article on it,
because it was like a big news.
Even maker community in 2006
somebody selling 10,000 units
was like, you know, when Apple makes the MAC book
it was, oh my, god 10,000 units.
So it was very, very, very slow.
And it required a lot of work from our pipeline.
At the beginning, we spent and stay amount
going around Europe
convincing people to use Arduino,
teaching free workshops, you know,
speaking on somebody's floor
and doing those kind of stuff
to get people to adopt Arduino.
And working on the website
to make the documentation accessible.
And then slowly,
some people start to use Arduino,
they start to build good projects.
It's not to share the fact that they use Arduino
to build those projects
and the people say, “Oh, wow. What's Arduino?”
And then it got a multiplying effect.
So,
you know, now it's 11 years
that we have released Arduino.
And so
it takes a few years
and at the beginning they were a lot of people,
they're like, why are you doing this?
this is stupid.
So
but if the people who are doing that professional development.
They're like – we know this is stupid
why you're wasting your time with this?
Yes?
Are you saying completely aware of the electronic
potency we've seen on the internet
when you came across the designer?
They feel (inaudible).
Yes. There's a lot of projects in that area.
That's actually a product called Arduino (MKR)
-that the people deals a lot for that. -We believe in (pipeline)
anything that goes (inaudible) to impress you in any way.
There's a lot of nice projects that are based on
like turning, maybe closing into light displays
or using them as sensor to make music or stuff.
I mean, there's a nice – a lot of nice things like that.
But there was fashion designer from Milan.
She made this corsett
that uses
(inaudible)
it's like a special metal that contract and expand.
So that this kind of the corsett expands and contracts,
teaching you how to breathe properly
or it uses sensors
to gather like air quality and stuff like that
and is going to use that
so they're (inaudible).
So (inaudible) because that they're
the concept was going to strain data,
but it was also kind of
ng you how to breathe properly.
So there are some interesting projects
like that.
I think right now
the problem is that
their technology is still a little bit rudimentary.
So this process about various people
there is not a lot of
a lot of projects are
made with like connecting and updating it
to a lot of means
and they build it up flashing in your face.
So I wouldn't really define that as spectrum.
This kind of, you know, they’re kind of techie.
There's no like in the real work
to use that impression properly.
So there still a lot of work to do also on the tools.
The tools that have been too rudimentary
they're not
also
the electronics
this mean you cannot already take that clothing
and put it into the washing machine.
So, you know, there's still quite a bit of work to do
to make a next step after
this generation of products
which were a brilliant work
by this woman called (Julia Beacon).
And (inaudible) with (her) work
but especially they have the same
faith in re-progressing, of that.
Yes.
Oh yeah, you.
-Hi. -Hi.
If you meet somebody who has no
(inaudible) what real. What is he going to (inaudible)?
Oh wow.
Yes
it's another thing that I should
well, you know, to me
Arduino is a tool
that allows people to use electronic
as a creative means.
So maybe it's a little bit too
but in a way you know,
if it allows people
with no backgrounds
in electronics software
to be able to use electronics
to be creative anyhow.
And so,
I never really perfected
a better electrical (pitch)
because people also use Arduino
for all sorts of different things
so my generic elevator of pitch
sometime they don't apply to what they do.
So depending on who I talk to,
I gave them
I give them a different interpretation.
But to me it's a tool that enables people
with no background in electronics
or programming to use electronics
to be creative and innovative.
That's like a generic pitch.
Yes.
We often see a lot (projects) that
are amazing, that I believe.
But how about – can you tell us a project
that you’ve done yourself
that you're very proud of,
that is very significant to you?
Oh, wow. Yeah.
It hits me.
I have a strange relationship
with projects that (give light).
So when I stopped teaching in Ivrea,
because the school closed.
And before Arduino was able to give me
enough money to make a living,
I did a lot of projects.
I was working a lot in exhibition design
in Milan.
And so in Milan
there was a number of events
where people build these traditions of different kinds.
So I was building a lot of those kind of interacting exhibition.
So that's when I did like the most projects.
Then there's a number of things
I did with my students.
So in a way now,
I did – as new project
that are mostly for me or for work
or understanding was needed.
I think one of the interesting project I did
back in the days when we were drafting Arduino,
that with one of my friends
who was a student back then.
We developed the wallpaper.
They can work as a display.
So there – a wallpaper,
it's like a space – this was (a display).
So especially imagine there was a wall,
it was like 4 meter by 2 meter
covered in wallpaper.
But then,
you could turn the paper from black to white
and they were every pieces,
it was like 50 – yeah,
like 5 centimeters basically
and you could use it as a display.
You could write things on the wall.
And we developed that for Prada
for their store in Beverly Hills.
Well, we developed it as
this is product of the student value (that you will see)
and then after that they showed it to Prada,
Prada gave us money to develop it.
Then in the end
they didn’t put it into the store
but this - you had a 4 meter by 2 meter
prototype and we (inaudible) all of control.
And one of the application was that
people will send you a text message
and it say Arduino was to read the text message
and display on their wallpaper
as a big gigantic message.
That one was a
that one was a
I have – we – that we worked on it a lot to develop
those technology to be able to control (the pixels)
and that we did a lot of work on that.
Yes?
You are (Arduino), what was your
to drivers into entrepreneur to maybe
make idea to a reality?
And what is your advice on that (issue)?
Young entrepreneur.
When we – when I started working on Arduino,
essentially I joined this design school.
And I was teaching students
how to use electronics.
And the tools were kind of, you know,
even if they only work on Windows,
they were expensive.
And also there was this problem that
we use the (board) with a basic stack
which was a genius idea
when it came out
but the problem was that
bought tickets from the US,
go to view this everything.
It will be something that would
be less powerful than an Arduino mini.
It cost us $100.
And for that time
it was considered a fairly cheap
piece of artwork
because everything else that need
kind of better development
was much more expensive.
So the problem was that
if a student buys something
that costs $100.
They're not going to make
a lot of prototypes
because it going to be costly – they’re afraid of
blowing things up.
And especially don’t do prototypes
and they're afraid, they don't make it
because the only way to have a good idea
is to have 99 shitty ideas
and then suddenly like
idea number 100 and oh, wow!
This is good.
But
it's not like you wake up in the morning
and the first idea is good.
You have to go through the 99 crap ideas
in order to get to number 100.
So you need to make a lot of prototypes.
So you need to be unafraid
of blowing things up.
You need to be in a position that you feel
you can fix those, so that it's (true).
So that's why you are doing those elastic chips
that you can replace.
So we started to
I started to build tools for my students
first with the big chips
and (inaudible) and the students did the thesis
where we started using the (AVRs).
And then we developed like
like the part of the
part of their
some of the commands in Arduino.
Then we made I believe
so in a way, it was kind of a
we did
there was an identifiable problem.
The identifiable problem was not immediately
there's belief there's something that could make money.
So, sometimes when you try to create
something successful.
You have to define the problem
try to kind of work toward solving that problem.
But
don't be limited by the fact that,
now you cannot make money
because
back in those days,
there was a perception that it was not
money to be made with Arduino
because professional developers thought
that it wasn’t something they would use.
Now the issue is,
if those are not your customers,
you don't care what they think.
So they made fun of us.
And they said that we were stupid
and we made people stupid
because Arduino was stupid
and the examples are we got
and the web is great because (some states).
So the people who told me that Arduino
who was a – baby talk language for Pot heads
which you know
because a lot of Americans obviously see
artists are people who smoke drugs (noh).
And somebody defined Arduino
a tool for art is women and painters.
It was like, what the – you know.
So there was a lot of
(let’s call it) racist
who are making stuff (simple)
for people and, you know.
So the professional developers
thought it was a stupid idea
but that (was) not the market.
So then we ended up creating
millions of people who do embedded development
that completely outnumber
the professional developers.
And now they challenged
their market
because some people started to realize that,
you know, a lot of problems
can be solved with Arduino.
you don’t need a
and so in a way sometimes
if you are a young entrepreneur
you should – you should not be
you should not be limited by the fact that
the current way of doing something
tells you that your project
might not have success
because maybe you're trying to work
towards another group of people
that haven't understood yet
that their tools is changing their life.
So
clearly that requires that
you maybe have another way to support
your income while people understand what you do.
Okay. Can I have last question?
Oh wow, last question.
-It’s important now that I (inaudible). -Very important
Okay now, I will have
Last question? Yes?
Yes, so the question now come
which relates to business.
I guess so, I mean okay,
original having genius create something
because of your journey,
in a sense it was not a (inaudible)
because yeah, well, you know,
Engineering, cool stuff.
I mean okay, it's firm, it's working,
it works well, it works (now)
there's program that (involves).
Marketing has a limited different approach.
You know, it's a bit maybe
from creativity what you can not say,
-but why did you (inaudible) is back? -Mm hmm.
Yes, so what was the journey of your team
particular in this part?
Well, so it’s serious, you know,
I have a background in engineering.
I started electrical engineering
for then I dropped out university
so I actually don't have a degree
which is kind of funny.
Actually I do have a degree now
but it’s (inaudible) ceremonial.
-I have a -Oh no. No.
I have a honorary degree
I have an honorary PhD in English.
You know, it was a funny getting education.
But for me, when that happened
some of my friends were like,
“Oh no, they didn't give you a....”
that's what a
that's exactly this people
they understood.
This is not about electronics,
it's not about software.
It's about tools for teaching people about
I was very honored to receive that
the University of Bath.
I get to dress like (Andre Diaz).
It was kind of like an (avid) Harry Potter's situation,
where you can kind of walk in to the abbey.
You know, and I was like “Wow!”
You know, so it’s kind of a weird.
Well, getting there, I was super honored.
The other guy who got the honorary degree was saying
that he was John Cleese
from, you know, from Monty Python.
So, that was very good – very cool.
So apart from me not carrying a degree,
I did software for a long time
but I always work with designers.
And also being from Milan,
I always kind of had new people
that were either designers
or worked as designers,
I (date) a designer.
So you know it – in a way that was
I was in a way
at the crossroad of being an engineer
but understanding what designers do,
appreciating what they do
and working with them
because we need – I need a lot of websites
in my past career
so I was working with graphics designers.
So that's why when I went to (Kiev)
they interview to go to this school in Ivrea.
And they try to keep asking this quick questions
to see if I understood about design
and I was able to, you know,
to show that I understood
enough of design to be there.
So in a way
this thing was created
(at least) at the beginning not for in here
it was never the idea to create this for engineers.
It’s always for people that are not engineers.
The engineers already know how to use it, you know.
They already know how to do stuffs.
So they don't need
they didn't
they don't need Arduino
barely use it.
That's how engineers
they use Arduino in the closet.
They don't tell their families,
they don't tell their friends.
But then they use it
because my theory that Arduino helps
makes beginner
enables beginners
and speeds up engineers.
So I know engineers that they use Arduino
to kind of sketch something very quickly
and then they – they revealed in some other tool
they use for work.
But Arduino needs to speak.
So to beginners, it gives you simplicity,
so professionals give us speed.
So in a way it was
that was a real thing, you know like it's
an embedded development tool
creating the designs
by technically a guy that never graduated.
An engineer was also some of kind of anarchist
ou know, my friend (David Marquez).
A guy whose degree is in theater like
(Sigel)
with features of the ITP before
learning about, you know,
going to Masters at NYU.
He was doing (lighting in theater).
So, if not
there was actually group of random people
with weird ideas.
So
I guess – I don’t know if I answered you question.
More or less...?
-No, that's your experience, you know. -Yeah.
also I have to say, it seems to be
the use of the word “marketing”.
Because there are some cases
when I have to
when I deal with some, some north,
some engineers.
They consider the word “marketing”
like some kind of an insult.
Oh yeah.
These are all marketing.
It's like stating “Your mother has questionable moral”
you know, it's
while effectively,
the real problem of everything
that you create in life,
you said this, nobody knows
that you are a genius.
If you are a genius by yourself
in your room it doesn't help anybody.
You will be frustrated,
because if you think you’re a genius
and nobody understands what you do
so you
so you do something that's useful
that adds to society.
It is your duty to spend time,
explaining to people
what you do.
And if people don't understand what you do.
It's not their fault, it's your fault.
If few people don't understand what you say
and what you do.
It's your fault.
You can not say,
“Oh, nobody understands I’m a genius.”
No, you are a bad communicator.
Nobody understands what you are to society
because you don't able to explain.
And then obviously engineers know that’s not it.
To me it's about,
you know, if you have ideas
they need to be communicated.
You need to convince people to adopt these ideas.
That's why sometimes people adopt
stupid ideas because there are people
that have very little capability to think
but they’re really good at selling
their shitty ideas.
So we need more intelligent people
that are also able to sell intelligently,
otherwise the world will adopt stupid ideas.
That's the
Like Arduino.
Oh, maybe like Arduino, yes.
You know, other people will do projects
that challenge the status quo in a certain
area of human society.
And people will say
“Oh, that is stupid. And doesn’t you know,"
"doesn’t make any sense”.
So obviously, you have to be prepared,
you know, I need to get a lot of criticism
people write me hate emails, you know.
People email me like
"Oh, I hope they give our shitty company fails”.
“I want to see you cry.”
You know, so
anyway, thank you.
Thank you for that.
Okay, (the thing with Arduino time)
and I just want to invite anyone
who would like, you know
express a form of gratitude
how Arduino have changed your life.
And this is – this is important because...