It's the future! I've tasted it! Robots and Cryptocurrency
According to Back to the Future, we’re now officially in the future.
However at MeArm Robotics we’ve felt like we’ve been living in the future for at least a year now, as we make our living by making robotics, and to a child of the 1980s that in itself seems pretty futuristic. However this last few weeks we’ve started receiving a number of orders paid for with the crypto-currency BitCoin. People are buying Robots with Crypto-currency… all of a sudden it feels like we’ve leapt forward in time again.
BitCoin hit the news last year when it’s value peaked at around £1000 a BitCoin. It’s value now is around the £205 mark but it’s still hitting the news due to it’s incredible volatility and the fact that it’s essentially made up money. Most would be wary of accepting made up money, but services like bitpay.com allow you to receive BitCoin, converted to your currency of choice then deposited right into your chosen bank account. Just like regular money. We’re also fortunate to have chosen a shopping cart (Shopify) that allows seamless integration of the BitPay service into our payment systems.
So if you find a customer who wants to pay you in BitCoin, why not let them? You can convert it to the sort of cash you are used to, with service like BitPay, or maybe you could buy yourself a shiny new robot MeArm!
**Edit** Inspired by our leap into the future local coffee gurus roasting.house have started taking BitCoin too.
Read moreMaker Faire Rome T-2
This year we’ve made it to Maker Faire Rome! Well almost as it hasn’t started yet…
This morning we took a look around the site to see where we’ll be and get a good look at who else will be there. Seems we might have got a sneak peek at what the Geniuno team are up to as well. 
The venue is the University and Makerfaire have really taken over the place already! The whole place is full of people walking around with power tools making the tents ready for all the awesomeness to come!
On the right there is Christian (our lasersmith) or his arm at least!
We wasted no time finding our home for the next few days, G37
In the Electronics tent
We wandered around some more and found a cool statue and a bit of Geniuno promo material
Then of course it was time for lunch!
After all, when in Rome! (the purists will ask “what eat like the people of Naples?”)
Read moreThe Nottingham Creative Class of 2015
This summer has been an extremely busy one developing and fulfilling the MeArm Kickstarter pledges, but we’ve also had some other great successes that we’re just now getting time to reflect on and share via our blog. One of these is our involvement with Nottingham’s Creative Class of 2015.
The official blurb is that the ‘Creative Class’ is a group of companies chosen each year to represent the flair and entrepreneurial talent in Nottingham. Applicants do not apply. They need to be nominated by another business in the city who genuinely believe they fit the criteria to be part of The Creative Class and know enough about their business to write a thorough endorsement of their business. The Creative Class is sponsored by PwC and co-supported by Nottingham’s Creative Quarter, Nottingham Means Business (NMB) and Nottingham City Council.
We were very fortunate not only to be nominated but to be selected for the final ten! In a very hurried few days between being informed of our selection and having to give a presentation at the Creative Class event we were photographed at the near by Nottingham University Jubilee Campus.
In the photo is Christian Fraser-Williams on the left, who now expertly runs our laser cutters, and myself on the right with a small gaggle of MeArms. Christian had had not long joined the company through the Department of Work and Pensions Work Experience scheme but I thought he’d already shown enough of the right stuff to become an integral part of this growing firm.
A few days later we attended the launch event at the Nottingham Contemporary and met the rest of the Creative Class
This comprised
- All About Tourism – a marketing and events company.
- Azotic Technologies (@AzoticTech) -technology to allow every cell in a plant with the ability to fix its own nitrogen from the air.
- Impression (@impressiontalk) – a creative marketing agency.
- Games City (@gamecity) – clue in the name Tumour Trace – innovative technological solutions for screening, monitoring and early diagnostics of cancer
- Spinning Clock (@spinningclock) – a creative agency, specialising in marketing through live events, video production and digital media.
- Reach Separations (@REACHSEPARATION) – specialises in chromatography for the analysis and purification of small molecules.
- Hallam Internet (@HallamInternet) a digital marketing agency with a strong ethos for plain speaking and ethical activities.
- MeArm Robotics (@phenoptix) (us!) – MeArm is a pocket size robot arm. It was conceived to make robotics, electronics and programming accessible, and is open source.
- App Institute (@AppInstitute) – provide a SaaS (Software as a Service) platform that allows SMEs and individuals with little to no prior technical knowledge to create their own app.
Many thanks toJohn_with_beard for the list and links.
It’s a pretty spectacular line up to be involved in! The evening was fantastic and I’m really looking forward to doing more with the rest of the creative class to help showcase Nottingham as the spectacular location that it is! I’ll also be thinking deeply about robots…
Read moreBack into the Open Source Hardware Category
Those that know me understand just how “ranty” I can get about Open Source Hardware, so much so that I’m giving a talk at this year’s Wuthering Bytes Festival at Hebden Bridge about “Open Washing” your product and making your millions. Those who are really observant will have noticed that the MeArm v1.0 shipped last month, but the source files remained in my desk drawer! Well that’s all changed as of this morning. The files are now available in dxf format on thingiverse. So now you can cut it in any colour you want!
I’ve also uploaded the latest files for the Brains Board over on Github. So we’re back to be Open Source, all the way down…