Hobbyists in collaboration with Carnegie Mellon's Robotics Institute created 250 robots for Pittsburgh's 250th anniversary.

Here is the link to the project

And here is the video accompanying today's WSJ article:

IndyHall is what we all want to be when we grow up. And, how fast IndyHall grew up in only one year. HAPPY FIRST BIRTHDAY.

Click here for a video of Alex Hillman with the details of the event.

Time: Sunday, August 31st, 6pm.
Place: Triumph Brewing Company, 2nd and Chestnut, Old City Philadelphia

The Hacktory contributed $200 to the party fund. Please chip in yourself. Click here to chip in.

One of Europe's most innovative contemporary arts groups, Oslo-based Verdensteatret will bring audiences into a highly experimental audiovisual installation that goes far beyond the boundaries of conventional performance. Last winter, Verdensteatret sailed up the Mekong Delta, the same river that plays the veins and arteries around the heart of darkness in Francis Ford Coppola's Apocalypse Now. Inspired by their journey, louder is a symphonic collage of music and visual art: massive video projections of the Vietnamese countryside play as Soviet-era megaphones hurl sound in all directions. Gaping puppet jaws chase flocks of small metal figures across the room. An enormous mechanical spider looms over the scene. Verdensteatret uses sculptural scenography, mesmerizing generators of sound, and technological relics of a bygone era to create a spectacular universe that unites concert, art, and theate.

GEOMETRY

The home computer and Internet connectivity has contributed greatly towards a more connected and accessible visual world. A person from one terminal can see the Earth from space, view the building blocks of atoms or even watch a web cam sunset from Fiji. The Internet has enabled us to see our world from a vast number of perspectives through a vast number of technologies. We sometimes forget that the visual world is composed and also based around Geometry.

Thank you Phillip Torrone for the pic.

"There’s a huge geek scene in Philly," says Smith, citing not only the Hacktory, but Chiptunes, Make Philly, Ignite Philly, iSepta.org and video game competitions.

Thank you Liz Spikol for the nice writeup in this week's Philadelphia Weekly Lit Gloss column. Geek on.

Click here for the article in Philadelphia Weekly.

Click here for the video in Philadelphia Weekly.