That shirt is the bomb, yo!

Apparently, an "art-project" worn by an MIT student at Boston's Logan International Airport (both known for their sense of humor) has landed the student in hot water. In all seriousness -- where is the art in this? Aside from that, where is technology in this?

According to the news story on yahoo, this girl had the wires attached to play-dough as well as the bread-board. Why would you use play-dough unless you are hoping someone will mistake it for C4? Then when questioned her about her shirt she walked away (not a good move). Again, what exactly is being "shown off" in this "art-project?" The fact that you can light up LEDs on a circuit board with a 9-Volt? Let me alert MENSA.

Bottom line: don't group real innovation together with boneheads hoping to create hype and headlines. The motto "Socket To Me" will prove to be a self-fulfilling prophecy for her it seems.

WANTED: evidence of use

If you can find someone on the streets (a real person, not an employee of the company) carrying a bag like this:


Or even a suit like this:


We will personally send you a "Patchwerks" t-shirt. It's not that we don't want to see these types of applications -- we're just wondering who's driving the train here: the consumer or the good-idea fairy? Email Us!

The $3039.87 Conference!

Alright! Along with football season we're kicking off the fall conference season! And there's a bunch of events on the horizon, so where should you get your boss to send you? Let's look at the choices:

IFAI Tradeshow and Symposium -- October 2007
International Symposium on Wearable Computers -- October 2007
The Fiber Society, Fall Technical Symposium -- October 2007
Intertech Pira's 2007 Smart Textiles and Nanotextiles Conference -- December 2007

There are others, but let's look at these to get a broad spectrum.

First is the IFAI Expo, with admission to the trade show and the technical symposiums (E-Textiles and Battlefield Textiles) for $429. This is easily the best bargain of the bunch. For only $429 you get a full day of talks and open access to all the exhibits and of course all the participants. Plus the diversity of the attendees ensures that you'll exchange business cards with someone you've never met.

Next the 2007 ISWC. I'd love to go to this one, but it's a bit expensive and in an expensive city. The upside to its hefty cost is that it is a totally different crowd than most conferences. It's certainly a more academic and theoretical audience vs. the normal corporate crowd. At roughly $800 (plus the cost of spending a couple days in Boston) you'd have to be heavily immersed in this technology to make it worth you while.


Then there's the Fiber Society's Fall Technical Meeting. Again a pretty expensive conference (~$800), but I think that this one is WELL worth it. The tough part is finding time to make all the talks of interest (as many overlap). Despite being largely academic, this will still have a great mix of industry, government, and academics. If you truly want to be at the front-edge of technology, this is the place to be. Granted, some of the talks and posters can be more science than technology, this is still the best place to spot what's on the horizon and see who's bringing it to the fore-front.


And lastly we have Intertech Pira's Smart Textiles and Nanotextiles Conference. To attend you'll only have to pay....$3039.87 (at today's exchange rate). Let's look at what you get for your $3k:
1) 3 days of "overview" talks;
2) Finger-food at 2 receptions, possibly an open bar;
3) Prague in December (~28 degrees - F)!



I understand that these guys have overheads to pay -- but you have to remember that some of us have actually held these confereces before and we know how much they cost. One thing to keep in mind is that a lot of us are either bootstrapping or have a "severely" limited travel budget. I plan on going to a couple of these, and I will review them as I attend.

Tell me if there are any conferences that I've missed!

DIY interactive textiles and Web 2.0?

Why is the Web 2.0 such a big deal?

User-driven content. The notion of the web being a tool instead of a destination is what is driving the applications compiling Web 2.0. This idea is catching on in other areas of our lives to include our personal area network (PAN). Specifically, our PAN is the way we surround ourselves with devices to interact with various forms of media and information (phone, iPod, PDA, GPS, etc). For a while now companies have searched for ways to create a market out of this -- most recently there has been success in riding the iPod's coat-tails (via bags, jackets, etc.) This is incredibly hard to do because they've been thinking about the products as just that -- final products. What Eleksen is doing is providing a platform and a set of tools to configure your own PAN. For a good example, think of a high-end iPod jacket (~$500) vs. the Eleksen DIY kit (~$60 with all pieces).
This distributes the integration cost out to the consumer while allowing the consumer to customize his/her own product. This creates a user-pull that wasn't available to companies in the past -- much the way open-architecture did for software companies.

I am going to jump on the bandwagon and design my own iPod clothing -- and I encourage you too as well. Please send in pics of your creations using the DIY kits and let's see who can create the most innovative system. I'll post mine as I begin developing. Step 1 is for me to buy the kit...

next stop vegas!

That's right, I will be attending the IFAI Expo in October, specifically for the E-Textiles symposium.

There are a handful of talks geared toward the state of the market (most notable Eleksen). I am hoping that the talks are not all fluff and that a good bit of insight can be drawn from the talks. Since one of the biggest challenges in moving away from discrete electronics lies in the processing and power, it would be great to see more talks on these subjects. Solicore will talk about flexible power sources

Which I think will be key in the future -- solar can only offer so much and conventional batteries are bulky and heavy. There are other companies in this arena such as ITN Energy Systems and Superior Micro Powders. If you are attending the show/symposium drop us a line and let us know!!

OR Show = Eye Opening (revised)

So in walking the floor of the OR Show last week I was hoping to see a lot of cool products featuring smart-fabrics or some e-textiles...but there was very few to say the least. I saw a couple of jackets with iPod controllers, some PV bags, and one or two heating garments -- but that is all. Granted, this was the "summer" show so I would expect to see more at the "winter" show in January. However, in getting to talk to some of the companies it became clear that a lot still has to be done on the S&T side and manufacturability before the price points on these types of products can be lowered. Westcomb had a couple of iPod jackets with soft-shell configurations, but they were VERY expensive.
(upwards of $400!!...A more extensive review can be found here)

So here is my question: What will it take to bring down the price on these products? I'm thinking it isn't so much the electronics (although that is a big portion) as much it is the makeup of the garments they're integrated into (Gore, Event, etc) -- I believe the way the market stands now, only the high end pieces can absorb the added labor/materials involved in the electronics integration...

OR Show

If you have the means, I highly suggest attending the Outdoor Retailer Show starting Thursday in Salt Lake City.

I plan on attending and I will post a brief review of interesting products, trends, and people that I see at the show. I think there is a small fee (~$30) or something if you're not a buyer. More to follow...