ThingM blog

On the Raspberry Pi forums, Will is working on an Internet-connected catflap using blink(1), Raspberry Pi, Twine. The Twine is the sensor (it has a tilt-detection) and the Raspberry Pi + blink(1) are the output notification. Can’t wait to see the final installation!

Here’s a video he made demonstrating the general idea.

ThingM will be at Maker Faire Bay Area again, come visit us! We’ll be showing off blink(1) USB LED notifier, the entire BlinkM Smart LED family, including the wearable BlinkM MinM and the powerful BlinkM MaxM. We’ll be demonstrating cool uses of BlinkMs as part of home lighting, art installations, and using them with Arduinos & Raspberry Pis. You can even make a BlinkM into a tiny Arduino by itself.

Additionally, Mike will be giving a presentation on How Design will Reinvent Manufacturing and Tod ll be giving a presentation on how to turn an idea from Arduino sketch to a retail product, using blink(1) as an example.

Maker Faires are a huge amount of fun, packed with exciting things to see and great people to meet. Hope to see you there!

I’ve yet to put together a proper intro / getting started video for blink(1). Here’s a minor edit of our Kickstarter video that gives the rundown of the basic idea of blink(1) and how one would use it. To learn more about blink1, check out: http://blink1.thingm.com/.

And here’s a 20-second short version of the same thing:

One thing that’s pretty obvious in this video is we hadn’t settled on the final design yet, except that we wanted the light to come out the sides instead of on the top/bottom faces.

Three and a half years ago, we hired Kim Karlsrud as a temporary project coordinator. Little did we know that she was about to become an indispensable part of the ThingM team (that’s her, second from the left). In that time she’s done everything from organizing our meetings, running our sales effort, to writing our newsletters, to advising us on ecommerce strategy. She worked with design schools to get BlinkMs into the hands of design students and give us many inspirational ideas in return. She was the glue that held so many of our half-baked, partially working ideas together. Her matter-of-fact approach effectively conceals a ruthless negotiator and hard-nosed businesswoman, a quality that we took advantage of over and over. She became a good friend to me and Tod.

So we were ecstatic when Common Studio, Kim’s social design studio with Danny Phillips, had a string of successful projects. Their Greenaid Kickstarter project started their seed bomb gumball machine business (the machines and bombs are now found in stores all over the world) and directly inspired us to do a Kickstarter project. With Common Studio’s success, we knew that it was only a matter of time that she would turn her attention to it full-time. We are very grateful for her time and support in transitioning ThingM to a post-Kim world.

Kim, thank you very much. Good luck to you and Common Studio. We will miss you.