Embedded - 470: Upping the Chaos Level

Episode Date: February 9, 2024

Helen Leigh joined us to talk about putting together conferences (including Teardown 2024), indie hardware producers (including via Crowd Supply), and building communities. Teardown will be June 21-23 in Portland, OR, USA. More information about attending or presenting. Early bird tickets are available for a limited time! Teardown is put on by Crowd Supply, a company that helps hardware companies launch products. Hardware Happy Hour Portland is a regular meetup that Helen organizes. Helen will be hosting a meetup in Oakland, CA, USA on Feb 15: Oakland Sound Hackers. She is also hosting a San Francisco, CA meetup on March 6: Open Hardware Happy Hour.  Helen’s personal site is helenleigh.me. She has been on the show twice before in 355: Favorite Ways to Make Noises and 261: Blowing Their Fragile Little Minds. Transcript Memfault is making software the most reliable part of the IoT with its device reliability platform that enables teams to be more proactive with remote debugging, monitoring and OTA update capabilities. Try Memfault's new sandbox demo at demo.memfault.com. Embedded.fm listeners receive 25% off their first-year contract with Memfault by booking a demo here: https://go.memfault.com/demo-request-embedded

Welcome to Embedded. I am Elysia White alongside Christopher White. We are excited to welcome Helen Lee back to the show. This time we're going to talk about crowd supply and tear down their conference. And well, whatever else we feel like talking about. Hi, Helen. Hi, lovely to be back. Thank you so much for having me. Could you tell us about yourself as if we just met at a hardware happy hour? Sure, of course. So I am a self-taught hardware hacker and open source enthusiast, currently living in Portland, Oregon.

The stuff I make is primarily musical instruments. Before moving to Portland, I was active in both the Berlin and London hacker communities, did lots of stuff in both of those. And I used to make my living writing things about making, right? So I would make projects, write about them. I'd make products from time to time. And that's what I did for about 10 years. But now I live in the US on the West Coast. I've taken a job at CrowdSupply where I am head of community. And I'm sure we'll be talking about that. So yeah, that's me in a nutshell. And are you ready for lightning round? I'm ready.

I'm so ready for lightning round. What is your dog's name? Flux. That's a good name. Oh, yeah, she's got a personality, that's for sure. What kind of dog is it? She's a street dog, a mutt, very badly behaved, but also very adorable. Yes.

Okay, the next question is, is it a good dog? Such a good dog, such a good dog. But sometimes she's not fond of strange men. So she barks a lot at people she doesn't know. But in the house, she's very well behaved. Is she a fetch dog or a sniffy dog or a lap dog? Oh, all three. All three. When you go for a walk, does she walk well on a leash?

Or does she turn around and look at you and walk backwards the entire length of the walk? She's a good walker. She's a good walker. JoJo's a good walker. She just walks backwards. It's adorable. It's really funny and cute. Does she have any clothes?

Does she have any clothes? Yeah, yeah, she does. So she actually only has one coat and has a bald belly as well sometimes. So we have to put a coat on her when we go outside or she gets very cold. In the winter, I should say, not in the summer. Does she have any lights or light fixtures? Light things. Lights, blinking things on her you know no no she does not um but maybe we should get an led collar for her light it up shocking but i haven't put any leds on her yet and do you have a tip everyone should know oh yeah so um before we started recording this my my tip was going to be that, you know, like when you go through self-checkouts, you can mute them most of the time.

Yes, or turn them down at least. So that's my number one just normal life thing. So today it was difficult for us to get the microphone working and I just broke Alvaro's amazing USB cable tester called Is It USB or Is It Me, which has saved my life on so many occasions. So that is my tip today. I've switched my tip from the supermarket checkout to the you got to get this USB cable tester. You know, it's great. It lets you know if it's got data, if it's actually passing

data through or if it's just power. So I use it a lot. Thanks, Alvaro. And that's Alvaro Prieto from the unnamed Reverse Engineering Podcast. So we'll put a link to the USB or me. Yeah, we love it. We are happy to be sponsored this week by Memfault. Memfault provides a device reliability platform for IoT monitoring, debugging, and updates. Device operation no longer needs to be a scramble as issues with fielded units pile up. Instead, Memfault gives developers a more scalable and sustainable process to accelerate time to market, de-risk product launches, cut development costs, and deliver

higher quality products. So if you're wondering how you're going to monitor your units once they're shipped, or whether your firmware update plan is secure enough, it's time to take a look at Memfault. Or you can read their Interrupt blog for all of its fantastic goodies on how to debug hard faults, monitor units, or generally write good embedded code. Embedded FM listeners will get 25% off their first year with Memfault if you request a demo through go.memfault.com slash demo dash request dash embedded FM. It's a link you can find in our show notes. Thank you to Memfault for sponsoring this week's show. Okay, so you are planning a conference.

I am, yes. Why would you do that? You know, it's been a question I've been asking myself. No, I mean, I've done a lot of community events putting on workshops and putting on small events. I've run Hardware Happy Hour in probably like 10 different cities at this point. I've set up a bunch of different events, including Sound Hackers, which is my local event, which actually is going on the road to Oakland in a couple of weeks, which is all about sharing people's methodologies for making instruments, right? From some guys talking about

how they're using FPGAs for prototyping to people talking about like different materials they're using. Just, yeah, so I've got history. I've put on a lot of events before and I've been very involved in like a lot of the Eurohacker events. I've been part of Hardware Hacking Village for a bunch of years now. So I feel like I kind of know what makes a good event, at least in my eyes. And I just really feel like, yeah, I just really feel like doing it.

I'm excited, actually, even though I probably will regret it. No, that's not true. I'm pretty excited. It's a big challenge for me to actually run a conference, but one that I'm doing with a lot of enjoyment, actually. Does it seem like it's stacking a bunch of those smaller events together or is it a totally different animal um in some ways it's different um in that you've got a lot you have to balance the needs of a lot of different areas you know and you've got a uh it's not just there's not just one focus right so you've got to make sure that there's a good flow a good balance and that everybody's got something that's going to

keep them interested and happy you know so it's um it's an exciting it's an exciting challenge that's for sure and so there's the programming that keeping everybody interesting interested of course um and that there are a lot of facets of that with um getting the right people and getting the right audience and making sure that everybody understands but then there's all, what goes on with the wedding planning part of logistics. That's a huge part of it. We don't start really looking at the content until a good three months into planning. The content's really important, but there's also a bunch of stuff that you need to think about in order to put on a minimum viable conference, you know, from food and drink to like venue insurance, contracts, AV stuff, internet.

I'm having to put my own internet in the venue I've chosen, which is an interesting proposition. I know. Making a bit of a rod for my own back with the interesting venue that I've chosen, but I think it's all going to be worth it. Yeah. So as long as you've got minimum viable conference, right, you've got people fed, you've got people watered, you've got the internet, you've got some AV going on, you know, everything else is a bonus. So just making sure that that core structure is done and then you can slot interesting people and

interesting things around that, right? Okay. So the conference is Teardown. I don't know that we said that yet yeah yeah yeah no we haven't actually we haven't we haven't talked about the conference let me just describe teardown let's rewind a little bit so so teardown is a conference that has been run by the company i work for crowd supply for a number of years um since 2018 actually um and it's all about the practice of hardware right so it is very practical focused talks um really people who are making stuff talking to other people who are making stuff is the primary like that's the most um the most prevalent part of of the conference there's lots of workshops we have a hacker art exhibit We're having a retro computing area. We're doing loads of projects. People come from all over to talk about really interesting things. and just we get a really nice range of people talking from very practical advanced engineering

topics to people talking about how to make good documentation how to build community and then people talking about the projects that they do for fun it's very hackery it's very it's it's more grassroots than like a big conference. You know, it's not like people in polo shirts with roller banners, that's for sure. It's mostly people who are bringing their, it's like a hack and tell vibe. If you remember that, right, after Maker for Bay Area, they would always do a hack and tell. And that was super cool. So it's like very much like a hack and tell vibe.

Lots of people bring their projects. Lots of people bring their stuff they're working on and then yes it's not really you're not going to see any pitch decks it's hardware but it's very much by the actual practicality of it as well as a lot of the ethics we talk a lot about open source as well you know because that's our focus yeah and that's that's that's Teardown it is is pretty fun, and it's got a bit of a Portland twist to it. I actually heard of Teardown before I heard of Pride Supply, which is an interesting twist. Yeah, so it's a really cool conference,

and I'm pretty excited to be given the reins of it. And it's going to be in Portland? It will be in Portland, yes. The 21st through 23rd of June is when it's going to be. There will be pre-game and post-game. So OMSI, which is the science museum here, they're going to do a screening of hackers the night before.

And before that, I'll run a hardware happy hour. And we've got a bunch of people in the local area to give us tours of their spaces as well. So ProtoPastor are going to do something with their 3D printing. We can have factory visits to various different places before and afterwards as well. And oh yeah, Hackaday normally runs a brunch afterwards as well.

So there's all sorts of pre- and post-conference stuff happening as well as the conference itself. It's very sociable, I should say. We do stuff together in the evenings. We have like after parties and all that kind of stuff. So it's a pretty informal, sociable, convival hardware conference. It's funny, I was going to ask you, is it engineering or maker? And it sounds like the answer truly is both. Definitely it sits in it sits in that valley there it's not just maker i made this no no it's very much i'm making a thousand of these exactly more like

independent makers um and and you know that and there are like maker-y maker project type stuff that, you know, we have people coming along from that community, you know, Sophie Wong comes to talk about her spaceship before, you know, we put on a really interesting art exhibit this last year in 2023 with, you know, we put all of these beautiful like hacker projects on plinths with like nice writing and plaques on the walls next to them just to put these kind of things in a different context, there are a lot of kind of lighter tech workshops as well. That's for sure. But it's very much focused on like, electronics, and open source as well. Speaking of an art exhibit, I heard about the SETI Institute up there in Portland.

Oh, yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's run by Nandini, who's a really awesome community organizer here. And they run one of the hackerspaces. It's not really a hackerspace. It's a makerspace, I should say, that's inside of PSU, Portland State University. And they do all sorts of really interesting things. I'd say they're more on the, I mean,

maker-engineer side of things, and they're based inside of a university, so there is like a focus on education that they have there. So, yeah, we've been partners with them a number of times and hopefully in 2024 as well. We also work a lot with the physics department. We get, you know, electron microscopes for people to have a look through, which is super fun.

Yeah. Neat. Yeah, it is pretty neat. There's all sorts of cool stuff to look at. I only brought them up because i saw deborah ansel uh geek bomb projects is doing a actual show with her led clothes and bags and hats and i was like amazing okay i only saw this in one space and you should be putting this everywhere it's amazing anyway deborah was actually in my hacker arts exhibit in 2023 um and showed a bunch of her really awesome work um she's she's really talented um and she knows her she knows her stuff as well

deborah um but they also had it at a gap i was surprised and it didn't occur to me that that was possible until i started talking to you yes yes so the venue that i've chosen where i've got to put in my own internet bring in every single chair everything uh is actually a semi-abandoned mall in the center of portland called the lloyd center there's actually a famous thing that happened in this did you ever watch i tonya or you know who Tonya Harding is? Yes. Okay. So the ice skater that like broke her rival's leg or arm or whatever it is.

Anyway, so she practiced on the, in the ice skating. She, you know, she grew up practicing on the ice skating rink in the Lloyd Center, which is still there today. It's not,

it's full size anymore, but it's still there today. So it's like, it's one of these malls that has like everybody left right there's a couple of like stragglers there's one hot topic there's a cinnabon but the rest of it is like empty or it's full because it's so dead they've filled it up with some really cool stuff it's like gone the other side like there's a really cool lego store there's a bunch of vintage stores. There's a great comic store. Like all of these different creative little businesses amongst largely empty mall with an occasional, you know, hot topic.

It's quite an interesting venue. And yeah, we've got the, we've rented out, we've basically become tenants for a month, right? We've rented out what used to be the gap or more accurately it was like gap for women and get them then and get baby so there's like actually three separate areas in in the plus we get like the back staff room as well which is really fun um so yeah we're we're turning like gap baby into stage one and we're like we've all of the changing rooms we're going to have different installations in them um like i'm messaging all of my hacker friends right now like hey do you want to come do an installation in a gap changing room please like the cfp will

be by the time this um this podcast goes out the c CFP will be live. Sorry, the Call for Proposals. Look at me using acronyms like a naughty person. Yeah, so the Call for Proposal will be live, and we will be asking for people if they want to do installations, if they want to put something in the Hacker Arts exhibit, if they want to take over a gap fitting room to do something weird. We're also this year for the first time doing a hacker space program. So one of my favorite things about the Euro hacker events, I used to go to Congress

and camp and all that. I still do actually. But they have like this thing where lots and lots of different hacker spaces from all over Europe, they will come and represent. And it was, you know, they've come and represent their space in this wider space. And it's so fun to go from place to place and see people's projects and, you know, really get to know different hacker spaces from different locations. So we're doing that. So basically, if you're part of a hacker space and you want to come,

there's some free tickets that we'll put out there as well. So, yeah, all of that will be out by the time this episode airs. What would you put in a gap changing room? What immersive experience? So my friend Sherry wants to run a tiny karaoke booth, which is a Eurohacker tradition, actually. We always have karaoke at Eurohacker events. We have, I mean, the thing is with Portland, right, there's a bunch of hardware people, but there's also a bunch of like weirdo artists.

So there's loads of people who are looking at doing installations there's a guy called matthew rempays he does really interesting like cctv um installations where it takes the visual input from cctv cameras and turns it into like sound um and visual art um there's there's just all sorts of things we're going to do i don't want to i don't want to spoil it too much but there's definitely going to be a number of really interesting experiences in the changing room that sounds like a show title maybe not this show but okay i think you know i'm like okay what i want to do is i want to soundproof it so that it's well soundproofed. Oh, yeah. And then put northern lights and a heated Adirondack chair so that you're kind of laying. You can't lay down in the changing rooms, but something comfortable and solo.

And a heated Adirondack chair and then air-conditioned the crap out of the air. And so you're in winter, but... Okay, never mind. Sorry. Yes. But with screaming babies coming through the speakers? Where's the changing room coming? Oh, my word. And I think maybe the Northern Lights would sing the way I always think they should.

How do you think the Northern Lights would sing, Alicia? Well, kind of high-pitched with occasional, kind of like whale songs. Okay. Oh, I see. I can see that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I don't think they'd be high-pitched, though. I think they'd be really resonant. Depends on the color. The fast colors would be higher pitched. All right.

I can see that. I can see that. Okay. Well, my call for... No, I can't. I'm sorry. I won't be there. Okay.

What else are you looking for for proposals? Am I... Oh, proposals. Yeah. I mean, people who want to speak about things that are even vaguely related to hardware, open source, discussions about cool materials, talking about your projects, talking about things that you find difficult, lots of show and tells about how to do specific things. of recent years um was about was just a big technical dump around um uh current e-paper and also i did there was a really interesting one that was all just about usbc just like an hour on usbc um and it was super fascinating you can get really deep it's not like surface level talks i mean you can do like people come and talk about you know all sorts of things but

you can get quite deep um talks as well so that's cool um so yeah basically talks workshops art exhibit stuff um projects on tables people coming from hacker spaces anything really and it's going to be a really fun event we do lots lots of stuff together. So if you want to get involved, just say hi. Okay, so my origami flex paper that changes automatically because I put electrons in and so it's a software controlled. I have no idea where I'm going with this because I'm not making it, but it sure sounds cool doesn't it I mean I would just take some origami and put it on the wall why not don't tempt me my walls are kind of full right now address I'm not gonna give it out live on a podcast I do know a thing or two about security

giving out your address like on on the air is probably not the best idea we don't even really like it people give their email address on them no me either okay so conference i'm not done yet sorry go ahead i have questions about the mall oh sorry post-apocalyptic with cinnabon anyway yeah yeah i mean the mall a mall an empty partially empty mall sounds like actually a perfect place because you've got all those rooms that things can be divided up you've got the long concourse where stuff can be put in yeah how did how did how did you end up with that venue being a possibility was it like people were they reaching out and saying hey somebody should

throw a conference here no no well like like anything i mean finding the right venue is the most difficult and important part i think really because it sets the whole vibe for an event right so i just hit the pavement and i've looked at so many different places so many different places um and i just had gone to the lloyd center to go to the comic store actually um with my friend and and she happened to mention that she saw that there was a conference there before. And I thought, huh. I actually think a hacker conference inside of a semi-abandoned mall would be a really cool idea.

So, yeah, here we are. I've booked it. You actually had a name for these types of spaces. Oh, yeah, like liminal space. Well, it's because, I mean, oh, you mean a meanwhile space. That's the word I used, right? Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay.

So basically what I mean by that, so having done a lot of events on the grassroots side of things, a.k.a. without a budget, I used to use a lot of these like, quote unquote, meanwhile spaces. And what that means is if, you know, for example, in the Lloyd Center, right, it's a dead mall. Within the next three or four years, it's going to be, you know, bulldozed and developed, right? But until then, they're still trying to make a small amount of money before, you know, they're not going to put new big clients in there, but they do have a lot of space that's available. So if you can find those spaces that are somewhere that they're a couple of years off of being condemned or turned into something different,

you can often find really interesting, cheap spaces to host events. If you, yeah, you just got to hit the pavement and look around. But this is a lot different than going to your local Marriott or even your local university and saying, I have 300 people, five rooms in a ballroom and I want cheap catering. How much will it be? Just give me, give me the end total and I'll worry about the programming. Yeah, yeah, exactly. No, I mean, I did look at a few, I did look at a few places that were that, right? This turnkey solution. You turn up, they put the chairs out for you, they handle all the AV, blah, blah, blah. But what I kept coming back to was there's no get in time and you don't get any extra space. Whereas we could rent this unit for three weeks and have two weeks to build up something interesting and creative.

Right. So I just thought, let's experiment. Let's do something really cool. Let's see if we can get the community to come in and help us create something much more interesting than let's go listen to some talks at our local Marriott, which is great, too. But this is much more immersive and evolving. You know, I want to involve a lot more people and do a lot more fun things. I mean, it goes with the flavor of the conference. Well, quite exactly. I mean, if I held it somewhere else, it would have a different flavor,

but because I've chosen the Lloyd Center, it's got this slightly edgy, slightly hackery, 90s vibe to it, know um yeah i like it you're upping the chaos level i am upping the chaos level but you know i aim to do that more generally it's a good thing i'm not involved because i would be spending all my time pushing for a 80s vintage retro arcade. Oh, we're having one. Oh, God.

Don't worry. We've got all sorts of fun things planned. If we're going, you have to let me know so that I can plan these proposals. Not till June. It's not till June. It's not till June. Yeah. I mean, a bit of chaos is a bit of fun, in my opinion. I think, you know, you've got to leave a little corner for chaos.

Oh, chaotic good is my spirit level. Yes. That is my alignment. Always has been, always will be. It's my D&D alignment, chaotic good. Or at least chaotic neutral. Yes, sometimes. You can't be consistent if you're chaos. Exactly. I love chaos as long as I'm causing it. Okay, so what are the factors that go into choosing how to put on this conference? We talked a little bit about the logistics, which you've decided to brew your own. Mm-hmm. I have. i'm a very diy person though

i've always been involved in the kind of like diy hacker culture so to me that's just the world that i'm much more comfortable in you know and plus you get a bit more control as well um but i guess you've got to decide uh who who you're talking to you've got to think about your audience think about what they enjoy think about what they enjoy. Think about what they might enjoy. Think about their comfort levels and a range of different things. I think it's really important to think about the evening stuff as well because I don't love conferences that just degenerate into drinking at the end of – do you know what I mean? So if the only option is we can go to the bar like i

just think i mean fine go to the bar that's totally great but i like it's much more fun and more wholesome to do other stuff right so on a on the friday night afterwards with there's a reception at autodesk and they're putting they've got this fancy office in portland they always do something for us and then the the saturday night we do um a party at the hacker space called control h um which is always super fun um but it's it's more you know we also typically will do a scavenger hunt as well around portland um so we'll have to see if that's uh that would be really fun when a scavenger hunt around we do cycling cycle rides as well last year so it's just nice to have like an array of like pre-game post-game and then like after party

stuff so it doesn't it's not just the conference and it's not just drinking you know i think it's healthier how much does it cost to attend um well that depends on when you buy your ticket um so we have like we have a few different levels we do there's like uh an early bird which will be live the day this podcast goes live we do have like a pre-sale which is the the cheapest level and that um that is only for newsletter subscribers so that goes out every year um and then it goes i can't remember what we've chosen this year but it was something like it's like 150 i think um we also do have um a we do also have like a low income ticket program as well which is which you can get a ticket for 40 dollars um if you're struggling um and we have lots and lots of volunteer positions as well so depending

on when you get it it's between um 75 and 250 dollars basically is the is the price range and i i do reserve the right to um be wrong here because we haven't we haven't fully crunched all of the numbers um so uh yeah so we have um a range of them depending on depending on what but lots and lots of opportunities for free stuff too you mentioned volunteer opportunities so people who can't afford it and then lots of other activities so if you are in the area and and maybe want to pop in for a brunch you you can just say hello hello to everyone without you totally can you totally can yeah yeah yeah all of the pre and post game stuff is just general entry right you don't have to have a ticket to go to the screening of hackers at omsi i mean you have to get a ticket to the screening but you don't have to have a ticket to go to the screening of hackers at omsi i mean you have to get a ticket to the screening but you don't have to have a ticket to tear down um like

the hardware happy hour anybody can come that's the whole point of hardware happy hours and the pre and post game stuff yeah we want everybody to be able to come you know like the control h members will come to the saturday night party even if um even if they're not part of the conference itself. So yeah, there's lots of opportunities to get involved. And this actually is not your job. I mean, it is part of your job. This is, no, no, this is very little of my job. I mean, it takes up, you know, it's going to be taking up a certain amount of my time this year. But no, this is like a side quest for me, definitely. I mean, I do quite a few

events and it's something that's enjoyable to me, but it's certainly not something that I spend my day doing. I've never worked professionally in events or marketing or anything like that. So yeah, it's definitely a side quest for me, but a big side quest, you know, and an exciting, fun side quest. Primarily, my job involves finding and vetting new submissions for CrowdSupply, which is the company I work for. Do you want me to talk a little bit about that? Yeah. So my idea of CrowdSupply is something like in the Kickstarter Etsy Tindy family. Yeah. Is that the right sort of area to put it?

In the same kind of area, yeah. In that we do, so we're a platform for crowdfunding and selling open or somewhat open hardware devices. The primary function of my job at CrowdSupply is to assess new projects. So we've got a lot of criteria. We're not just self-service. You actually have to apply to be a CrowdSupply campaign, you know, and it's not for everybody, you know, like we have, we require a certain level of openness. We require a fully functional final prototype before moving to campaign which is a deal breaker for a lot of people like we're not going to campaign on a

render right like the product actually has to exist before we accept it right and we've got a bunch of other questions as well um so me and my boss uh josh lifton who's the co-founder of crowd supply we meet every day and we just go over all of these submissions. Right. And we, you know, we can't be domain experts in every single in every single type of technology. But we're trying to do due diligence, like research what they're doing, try and find what equivalents in the market. You know, we just do our homework right um and that's what i spend a lot of my time doing is is um is asking questions and doing a lot of research about other people's projects um contracts emails yada yada it's all good um and that's and that's the intake but i

also do quite a bit of outreach as well and By which I mean, I just message people and, um, or like talk to people at conferences if I think they're doing something cool and say, hi, we exist FYI. Um, but yeah,

like super light touch. I don't do a lot of that. Yeah. Mostly it's mostly it's success, um, assessing and questioning new projects. So I'm just finishing up, uh,

the last class, class per cohort class per cohort and uh that means the the students turned in their projects and i got to write critiques for them oh i hate doing that well my goal with the students is that they make a portfolio project for interviews and i want them to make something they like and something they would be happy to work on in the future. Oh, that's nice though. So my criteria isn't, is pretty loose. And the best part about it is learning all about the new sensors and applications and ideas people have. I just love that part. Oh, for sure. For sure. Do you end up with, you you know 45 open tabs at the end of the day um at least i mean one of the reasons why i think i'm well suited for this job is you know i had 10 years

as a freelancer and i've worked with basically every microcontroller you know common micro controller out there most of the common senses that exist right like i've even made projects using the intel galileo right so that's for my sins right so like you know i wouldn't say that i have a very deep knowledge in any particular um genre of hardware but i have a very broad knowledge of what exists what's out there what people are doing with it right um so yeah i mean i try and keep up on that. It's probably the thing I enjoy the most about the job is seeing what other people are making, seeing what people are up to, seeing the trends, seeing what new Silicon people are excited about, or what new like open library has resulted in something unexpected, you know, I really enjoy that aspect of it,

kind of getting that bird's eye view of what independent hardware makers are doing at any one time, you know. So like, for example, during the chip crisis, you know, there was a noticeable, like you could just see if it was if it wasn't ESP32 or RP2040 like you were just out of luck right so I would see like all these FPGA projects coming in and then being like sobbing because they couldn't get like anything for like two years basically so the only things that we were getting in were based on the available silicon which was really interesting to see how people got creative with what they had available you know it's pretty cool did you write critiques do you tell people yes as long as you or no thank you this is why it's a whole conversation and you know no absolutely

we go into depth really and i try and give good feedback particularly if it's for somebody who's starting out um you know and sometimes it's a perfectly good device it just doesn't really work for crowd supply you know or if there's if there's nothing that's open like we're not we're like oh it's not like that it has to be open source hardware like certified gold standard you don't have to have designed it in keycard and release your editable board files right but we need you to like release firmware and at least a schematic so people can actually see what's going on behind uh behind the behind your black box of technology or you know like as an indie creator like sometimes you fall off the map right it's not like you're going to be doing that product forever so it's really nice that people will actually be able to see and possibly service these devices, even if the

creator drops off the map, because they know what's in it and how it works. That's a good thing to remember that indie hardware folks don't always realize is that they're going to want to go on and be done with this at some point are there other common pitfalls that the indie hardware folks oh gosh yeah lots um i mean i mean there's some things that are i would say people don't know a lot about logistics we get a lot of um creators who are engineers but don't know a lot about anything else. So stuff like, if you're importing an assembled board from China these days, you're going to have a 25% tariff when you're importing a lot of goods, right? And if you're just someone who's worked

with JLCPCB, you've got PCBA here, PCABA there. You probably won't know that. And it can really destroy your profit margin if you don't account for that or, you know, not manufacture in China, you know, but there are. Obviously, it's cheaper. So definitely learning. So knowing about that tariff, that trips a lot of people up. People underprice their products a lot. I blame Raspberry Pi for that for that right they've got unrealistically um inexpensive hardware and people think that they have to compete well that's not

true i mean particularly for credit supply actually our customers are not very price sensitive they would rather have like the luxury version with like all of the bells and whistles rather than this is a cheap board right um so underpricing is a big deal. And I see people who like have really destroyed themselves down the road by underpricing, right? Because if your product takes off, you want it to be sold by distributors, right? Well, if you don't have an extra 40% margin assigned to that, then your distributor is is not you're not going to get a distribution deal right because the distributor wants their cut and if you don't price that in from the beginning um you're going to be in trouble so definitely enterprising is a big one

um thinking that engineering is the the the only task right i get a lot of this like well yeah i have made the hardware now i'm just going to put it on a website and i'll get lots of customers right yes of course why wouldn't i it is brilliant if i build it they will come that is i i bump into that time and time and time again it is not true and the people who do really well are not are not just the people who are good at hardware it's the people who are good at hardware and good at communication right and then that could be like writing or that could be like video whatever you just have to have a way that you can actually speak to people particularly in indie hardware people want to buy from people right so if if it's just yet and what what we call yam curb right yet another microcontroller board um like if it's

just yet another microcontroller dev board you know and you've got no community or anything you're just not going to find you're just not going to find an audience so yeah thinking that you're engineering is the most important thing in terms of making a product you know but there's so much after that so much after that um what else oh yeah people who don't get feedback early on again similar to build it and they will come they like secretly work away and secretly work away for ages on this device like making up a solution you know and but they've not actually tested it with anybody who might want to buy it. They've not, you know, gotten proper feedback at different rounds and then they just launch it and expect, you know, what was in their brain to be perfect

for everybody else. Right. So, yeah, getting early feedback is really important, but people often neglect to even talk to anybody about it. Well, they might tell me it's a bad idea. I know. That's actually good. That's good, though, right? Like, you want people to pick at it. I mean, you can't please everybody. You can't, like, you know, you can't go away and try and incorporate every single feedback you get, right? You know, and sometimes you have to take

people's feedback with a pinch of salt, but you've got to get it out there and see what people are saying. It's valuable, even if they don't like it, especially if they don't like it, actually. But there is some difficulty there. Sure. I mean, okay, so I'm working on the last images in my book, and it's going badly, and that's fine. It'll work out. But showing them to people and saying, there's something wrong with this, and having people say, it's just bad, there is no good, was really hard. And I didn't like it. And I knew it wasn't true because I'd had other people say, this makes sense. And yes, I see where you're going with this, but that whole,

how do you, how do you know who to trust? How do you decide how you only, I mean, I only hear the negative feedback. Of course. And listen, like I've been roasted on the internet and it's not a pleasant feeling. And people are mean when they don't know you as well. Right. So I would just say like cast a really broad net and don't take any one data point as, you know, take it as an average. Right. Don't take the meanest or the most praise-filled feedback.

So cast a broad net, but also do it in real life as well. People are much less likely to be horrible in real life. That is true. Although most of my real life is Christopher, and he usually likes me, so it's easier. It's also about how you talk about it as well you know particularly with regards to hardware you know people are allergic to here's my startup here's my product come and buy it here's an advert you know but if you're asking if you're asking people for genuine um genuine feedback and actually listening to it i think and and being engaging in places that it's relevant

to engage you know not just spraying spam everywhere um i think you can still get some really quality feedback from the internet if you ask nicely. Yeah, and if you ask the right people and you don't just ask everybody everything and keep saying, I sent you an email, how come you haven't responded yet? Yeah, yeah, yeah. It does not do you any good. Yeah. No, I agree. But yeah, it's been hard for me to figure out how to get the right amount and right quality of feedback sometimes. It's true.

The idea that you give some critique for projects is amazing to me because I do know how long that takes. Yeah. I mean, obviously, if it's really not relevant for the audience, then it's much quicker. But if it is relevant to the audience, but it's just not quite right. I'll often see a lot of people trying to compete on cost, like doing a lower cost Arduino Uno clone or whatever clone or whatever and i'm like two dollars is not going to make any difference you know um so but but in that instance it's like they've clearly got the skills to design you know a good piece of hardware right it's just that they're not you know they're just they're just putting those skills to use in like a really over a really saturated area for example or they're using like

really old stuff or you know so we can point people in the direction if it's like design or we can you know and a lot of the time it's that they don't you know people don't have prototypes and they don't have anything right so we just you know tell them to go away and come back once they do actually have a real device um so that you know, we actually do get people back in. You know, I always say I'm very happy to be proven wrong on any count. You know, as I said earlier, we can't be domain experts in every single genre of technology. It's just that, you know, we invest quite a lot

into the people we work with, both in terms of time but also money um so i guess i should have mentioned this earlier so basically yes we have a we have we do crowdfunding campaigns yeah but that's that's kind of the start of their relationship with us um so um crowd supply so if you if you earn like we match fund basically so if you earn like 50 grand on your crowdfunding campaign we will place an order paid in advance for an additional up to 50 000 worth of product so we basically instantly become your biggest customer and you and we will pay that in advance along with the crowdfunding money so basically basically you get double in advance. You have to deliver product. We don't take equity or anything like that. We're literally just placing

a large advanced order. And then we sell that, but also our parent company, which is Meiser Electronics, they sell that. So any successful creator, I shouldn't say any, most successful creators go on to be distributed with a non-exclusive deal with Meiser Electronics. And that's international as well. So, you know, and that's not a small amount of work to set somebody up as a Meiser supplier and to set up all of these like orders and to get them onto our system. So that's one of the reasons we're quite choosy is we invest a lot into our projects. Yeah. I mean, it makes a lot of sense that that's why you have to spend the time up front.

Well, I didn't realize that. That's pretty cool. Yeah, yeah. No, it's a really good deal, actually. And it helps indie creators really get those lower production costs, right? Yeah. those lower production costs right um yeah and i think that's one of the most powerful things that we offer along with the you know whole mauser situation and they do all the you know that's another thing that they do is um they do all the delivery right so they do all of the logistics for

all of our campaigns so basically our creators just send our warehouse one big box of product and the mazer warehouse team will pick and pack it um to all of their um crowdfunding customers and all of their future customers as well so they don't have to you don't have to touch an address label with us as somebody who is allergic to address labels oh seriously i know like i've done a bunch of my own little projects before and the worst time i ever had was like when i was like you know what i'm gonna make my own thing and i'm gonna ship it out myself and then i got a few orders in and i was like oh this is terrible like terrible no why why did i try and distribute it myself never again i yeah some people like that you know some people really like taking control of that side of things why did I try and distribute it myself? Never again.

I, yeah. Some people like that. You know, some people really like taking control of that side of things, but like me, no, I hate it. Like, yeah, so, poosh. I have a couple of listener questions. One is from Chris Greenlee, and we already answered this,

but are there dates for Teardown 2024? Yes, the 21st through the 23rd of June 2024. And there'll be pre- and post-game stuff as well. So you can stick around or come early. That'll be in Portland, Oregon? Indeed it will. And is there a remote aspect to this? So there typically is.

The answer is that depends on what internet I can get installed. So maybe we'll see on the we'll see basically we'll see what we'll say on the internet we would typically do it we will release the videos for free on youtube afterwards if we can't stream if the internet's not good enough for streaming then we will release them we will release them afterwards yeah we did we did it last year but it's not a minor undertaking to do a decent job of streaming none of this is a minor undertaking

so yeah I'm not sure so the streaming is one thing that I'm that's like a nice to have rather than a an essential and that's very much dependent on the internet situation so yeah. Sila asked what are what is your favorite band? Oh my goodness um well what's my favorite band? Yeah that one seems kind of hard. It is really difficult um I could tell you things I've been listening to a lot recently.

So I've been listening to Janelle Monáe. She's poppier than you might expect. But Janelle Monáe, a lot of people might know her for acting, actually. I don't know. But she also does some really, really awesome Afrofuturism sci-fi stuff and she did this whole like two concept albums um like that was all around like this this android that fell in love with a human and was being chased and she had to escape and then it turns out like she's you know some kind of special being but it kind of it you know it came out in i really enjoyed the fact that she used video plus music, plus she actually released a bunch of prose as well around that.

So I thought that was super cool, that multimedia aspect to it. So I've really been digging a lot of her work recently. But in terms of my favorite band, that's too difficult. Let's just say Led Zeppelin. Let's just say that. No one's going to get fired for saying Led Zeppelin, right? Let's just go with that. Yeah, I grew up with a lot of Led Zeppelin.

My dad was a big fan of Led Zeppelin, so let's just choose that. Let's just choose that. Oh, I have got a music thing to share, actually. And I am only sharing this because I told my boss this yesterday and he had no idea. So, you know, the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy radio play? You know, the entrant tune? You know, on the banjo. Yes, I remember that.

Yeah, you know it. You know it. That's actually, it's not just, it's not an intro tune. It's actually a full length track by the Eagles and it rocks. So if you didn't know that wasn't an intro tune. It's actually a full-length track by The Eagles, and it rocks. So if you didn't know that wasn't an intro. Yes, The Eagles. It does sound like The Eagles. I know.

Literally, go and give it a listen. I'm terrified I've said the wrong band name. No, I'm certain it's The Eagles. But yeah, it's called The Journey of the Sorcerer. And if you're a Hitchhiker's fan um you'll definitely enjoy it uh silah would also like to know if you have a favorite fruit to make an instrument of oh okay okay now that changes my answer it was gonna be blueberries but you just can't play those.

Oh, yeah, yeah. You can't play a blueberry. You can definitely play a blueberry. You can play anything, pretty much, as long as you're using the right microcontroller. Most fruit, I mean, it's just water, right? You know, you just, it's so. I mean, the classic is the banana, of course. You know, everybody's played a banana well not everybody but you know a lot of people a lot of people have

played a banana i use it for all my phone calls but i don't know how to play right right actually my funnest the funnest thing that i made with fruit to play was actually not the fruit itself so i made a bunch of raspberry jelly that i used as and i made them in these molds right and then i used them as bongos and it was oh my gosh it was so funny like the slap and the wiggle oh my word the slap, the jiggle Oh my god Nope, we're not using that for a title So you're typing that for a title We're not using that for a title

The slap and the jiggle The slap, the jiggle and then the synth noise I mean, who could ask for more? Yeah, yeah So that's my fruit question My favourite fruit in general Is probably a good old apple. What can you play on an apple?

Anything. Anything. They run Logic and Ableton. Okay, so last one from Sila. How did you get good at writing? Oh, how did I get? The same way you get good at anything by doing it? No, everybody hates that answer. I know. It's the worst answer. So frustrating.

I know. You just got to do it. That's all I'm saying. You got to do it and you got to read a lot and write. You know, you are what you do. So as long as you, you know, when you're writing, you are a writer. And yeah. And in terms of, I mean, you know, if you're looking to, if you're looking you are a writer um and yeah and and in terms of i mean you know if you're looking

to if you're looking at that question as like how do you do it professionally um then just you know you'd need you need like three things on your portfolio you know like i always say you've got to have three things i've worked at x x and x so if you've got three things you can you can make an interesting sentence out of it so get get three things on your cv or resume whatever you call it here um and then you can start shopping yourself around um but you know I mean writing is good but you have to have something to write about as well right so there's there's the content side of it and then there's a stylistic side of it I mean I wouldn't say I you know I'm not an amazing prose writer or anything I would I'd consider my writing I guess I did do like some journalism stuff as well but primarily speaking I would consider myself like a writer of recipes but it's just it's not the you know the recipes

are for electronics um rather than you know food so yeah a writer of recipes i consider myself a writer of stories even as i'm working on a technical book and you say writer of recipes and i'm like okay yeah there are different kinds of writers oh totally totally i've done i've done a bunch of different kinds of writing as well but um the the recipes are easy to sell in right they were you know you you um you can always everybody always needs uh a make everybody always needs here's a cool project that uses this cool thing if you can write it up nicely and make sure it's current then um you know it's easy to relatively easy to get paid for an article right so um yeah there's there's the skill but then there's also having a sense for content and what fits in if you write it places that you can sell no

no unfortunately you were well people people have to know about you people have to remember that you exist as well i mean that's basically what my twitter was for back in the day when I was a big Twitter person. You know, partially it was sharing the projects that I do and partially it's just reminding people that I exist so that when a project comes up, they're like, oh, I remember this person. Maybe we should get her in to write this thing. Right. So, yeah. to write this thing right um so yeah and so now you work for crowd supply where before you used to do conferences more grassroots and be part of them and organize but not be in charge and before you used to have communities and support communities and talk to people about their

projects and be interested and write about them and you did all that for fun and now they're paying you to do it it's true i've done kind of like a 180 on what i do for fun and what i do to get paid like for a bunch of years i was doing accounting for fun you can tell me i was not doing accounting for fun like my word my word like no like i'm tax day i'm usually crying don't worry like um no um so so while i was working as a maker slash writer slash you know whatever it was that i could do to make money um i did a lot of community work just on my own, just because I loved it, just because I've gotten so much from the hacker and maker community myself. So when I say I'm a self-taught maker, actually, that's nonsense. I've been taught by the community.

I've been taught by people in hacker spaces. I've been taught by my friend in a kitchen you know I've been taught by youtubers and I just really want to be able to give back to that kind of community um so I really enjoyed doing I did that for fun right I did that for fun but also as a sense of obligation and also as a sense of activism you know um but I got to a point where I was making things I was really dissatisfied right of activism, you know. But I got to a point where I was making things, I was really dissatisfied, right, with the way, you know, like, because when you're making something, and you've always got to make it help you pay your rent, you know, you've always got to make sure it sits in six pages, or, you know, you're explaining the same things over and over and over again. Like, I've explained what PWM is like a million times. And honestly,

I got to a point where if I had to explain PWM again, I probably would have just laid down and died. I was so over it. I was so over the recipe writing. And I was really ready to do bigger, more ambitious projects that wouldn't really work for the content that I was making. So I consciously made a decision to go into a more like traditional job job. So I'm not like making my own devices, like I'm helping other people make theirs. I'm like running events and, you know, like, like any job job, a lot of it is contracts and emails. Right. Um, but I did that on purpose so that, you know, I can get all this spare time to, uh, to make stuff. Now, obviously when you work full time, it doesn't always work

like that, but that was the idea, right. That I would start getting paid for, um, my hardware community work and then have the brain space in the evenings to really advance my technical skills and work on my own projects. So that was the idea. I mean, it's been a really difficult transition. Um, I mean, and also I immigrated to a new country in December, 2020, which was very complex and confusing, but now, now I kind of know my way around and I've rebuilt my workshop I it is actually starting to turn out like I had hoped I mean like Monday to Friday I don't have any energy to work on my own projects but on the weekend or say over Christmas period like I actually do manage to get stuck in and work on some of the projects that I always, you know, and level up some of my

skills in ways that was difficult for me to do while I was like constantly like hustling, making these projects. Right. So yeah, it's been, it's been a weird change, but it's starting to pay off. I think. Cool. You mentioned you were working on a sequencer. I'm working on a sequencer. I mean, to be honest with you, it's, I mean, it's less about, it's a sequencer i'm working on a sequencer i mean to be honest with you it's i mean it's less about it's a project that i'm working on um for an educational aim right so i mean i've messed around in keycard a bunch of times in previous versions but the new version of keycard seven is like a huge step up everyone's saying oh it's so much better blah blah blah and i was like right fine fine this is my project to learn keycard 7 because i've been seeing everybody's

i've been seeing everybody's like beautiful renders and like i'm like oh look at these real nice things that are coming out from keycard 7 and every you know the days of svg to shenzhen are thankfully over you know it used to be so painful to make something pretty in keycard, but it is much more enjoyable now. So I've been focusing in on that. And I also, like, I've designed a bunch of breakout boards and stuff before, but I've never designed my whole system from scratch, you know, like with USB, microcontroller, power, everything, right?

So everything on one board. So it's really an exercise for me to level up my PCB design skills and also become much more comfortable with KiCad as a piece of software. And also just as a design exercise, right? It's been really interesting. Yeah, I've been working with my friend um i don't know if you know timon oh yeah yeah yeah yeah okay so timon's my friend from um from you know german hacker circles you know um and we've been talking uh maybe like once a month i'd say um for the last

year or so and i will just he's been super generous with his time i will ask him um a bunch of questions like i'll do all my own work and then i'm like why is this like this what happens here and he we did this really really fascinating because i've always been a little bit nervous about usbc right because there's so much you can do but we did this really interesting session where we like just sat there for an hour and all we did was look side by side at like different open source hardware like their implementations of usbc right so we could look at the commonalities and well you know while i can read my own schematics having somebody there who is an experienced designer where i could be like why have they done that why is this bit different to this like this is like what i call like design engineering right um and that stuff is much harder to learn like i can

learn keycat on my own right i can learn how you know i can i can look at a reference design on my own but like it's about the design choices that i felt were um not really visible to me um as someone who doesn't have formal training in electronics design. So, I mean, obviously, you know, when I say electronics design, I'm not talking like analog or like, you know, like RF is, and analog designs are witchcraft to me. I'm talking about like moving components around on a PCB, right? But still, like all the design decisions that go into that, you know, it's been really fascinating to be able to speak to someone on a semi-regular basis about the decisions that I've been making. Yeah, it's been really fun.

I've really enjoyed it. I've really enjoyed it. And KiCad 7 actually is way better than the previous one so yeah um if you take nothing away i'd definitely recommend taking it taking a peek at key cad 7 if you haven't already that's a good one well they they put a bunch of there's they put a bunch of money into it and i know that cern put a couple of their engineers on key cad for a couple years i don't know if they're still going but um but that really stepped up the whole um the whole program for that software definitely yeah it's good cool oh but you were going to ask us about the raspberry pi i was going to ask you about

the raspberry pi so the um so yeah my my question to you're like, do you have any questions? And I do have a question for you, actually. So for my sequencer that I've been working on, I'm using the RP2040 as the microcontroller for this device. And I'm primarily using the RP2040 because it's got really great documentation for someone like me. So I can go in and I can really look at the example board designs, and they do really lay out a lot of the reasons behind the reference design. So I've been finding the main reason why I've chosen RP2040

is the good documentation as well as the community support. However, I was wondering if you take away that community support and the docs and, frankly, the availability of the RP2040, how do you rate the actual functionality of the silicon as somebody who has done a lot of embedded design and used a lot of different chips? So, yeah, that's my question. I think it's pretty good. You know, it has a nice selection of different chips. So, yeah, that's my question. I think it's pretty good.

You know, it has a nice selection of peripherals. The core is in Cortex-M0, so you can, you know, compare it to all the other Cortex-M0s out there. It's got the programmable IOs, which are interesting for certain uses. Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I'm going to use those. Oh, I'm going to try and use the PIO. That's one of the reasons I chose the RP2040, because I want to play with the PIO functionality. Yeah, sorry, yeah. I'm going to use those. Oh, I'm going to try and use the PIO. That's one of the reasons I chose the RP2040, because I want to play with the PIO functionality. Yeah, sorry, go ahead. I think the only weird thing is, something you mentioned last episode, Elise, is that it doesn't have internal flash.

Right. So that makes it more expensive, I think, to integrate into a system. It makes it more complex to put on a board. Right, but you also have to, if you're price comparing an MCU with internal flash against the RP2040, it's not apples to apples. And that has

manufacturing implications as well. Some good, some bad. Unfortunately, I hear a lot of people saying they're going to use the PIO and I don't see a lot of people using the PIO. Which worries me a little bit. I don't see a lot of people using the PIO. Which worries me a little bit. I don't like that about it.

Is it just that it turns out to not be necessary because it's got all the other profiles? It's just it ends up being a... It's tricky. It's not something you're just going to do as a C programmer in a minute. It's got great documentation. And you get used to using the libraries and you get used to it being pretty simple. And you can prototype everything on Walkway, which is brilliant.

Yes, try it, Walkway. it's hard. And maybe if it was hard the whole time, you'd be like, okay, I can do this. I'll push through. Or maybe it would always have been that hard and you would just not be willing to fuss with it. So I'm interested in hearing if you do successfully use the PIO. I'm not saying nobody has. People definitely have. And I've had at least one student successfully do it. I just end up having a lot of students that say that's my plan and I'm like you know there's already an I squared C part right? Oh yeah. Don't use it if you don't have to.

You should be using it for something weird not for something normal. Or something fast. Yeah yeah yeah. I've seen some examples of code but I mean I'm not spun up the board yet so well actually one of the other reasons I'm embarking on this design journey is I'm really interested in production. Back in the midst of time, I used to work in book publishing and I was always really interested in the production side there, you know, like the paperweights and the different finishes and so on. After listening to Bunny talk about, sorry, Bunny Huang talk about

all the different advanced PCB services you can get these days, I've been, and like, of course, seeing all of the different artistic ways in which people are using like silk screens and different layers on the PCB in the wider like hacker and to a certain extent badge culture as well. I'm just, I just really want to learn how to make cool effects on a PCB, you know, and that's, that's, that's what I really love. I just like the nitty gritty of how things are made and like how things are actually laid down and different production options. I just think that's super interesting to me. I'm on a Discord where there's a channel called Cute PCB,

and it has the neatest PCBs, and they're all colored. I mean, it's a maker. I think you're on it too, but I don't know if you play there. I don't do anything anymore. But they talk about how to get things to look right what what to put copper under so you get a translucent effect versus a colored yeah yeah exactly so amazed by that and exactly hair down last year had at least one maybe two talks about making pretty yeah yeah we did yeah we did um i, it's so much more accessible than it used to be to get these things done and so much cheaper as well. You know, you can do some really interesting things. Yeah, that's very much the kind of thing that we would go into at Teardown. Very much like we love that kind of, we love that production stuff. That's what saying like the practical side of electronics you know it's super interesting the practical side making your

board look like a cute cat yes yeah absolutely so i have a question about your job again and being head of community yes which is kind of a weird title it It doesn't really, I don't know that that's what you do, but community is something I do think about with you. It's true. You mentioned earlier you aren't on Twitter anymore, you're not doing social media. Where are you finding community these days? So historically, I used to go to the internet to find community, to share my projects and to find other people who were interested in the same weird things as me. But as I've gotten older and more involved in the hacker community, and also as I've relied less on social media to find work, I find that I'm actually going to real life events and setting up real life meetups to fulfill the same need.

Right. So being able to share my projects in real life with people like on a table in front of them, there's no one who's being mean to me. And, you know, I just couldn't stand the sniping on at me on social media. Like it was just every so often it was just there. And, you know, you might hear 100 positive things and then like one bad thing. the sniping um at me on social media like it was just every so often it was just there and you you know you might hear 100 positive things and then like one bad thing but then I would just always get hung up on the one bad thing so I would just be like you know what this isn't worth it for me anymore I'm not actually having fun I feel bad about sharing my projects so I just stopped engaging really with social media and started, like I started Hardware Happy Hour in Portland, which has over 500 members now. I started Sound Hackers so I

could find other people who are making instruments. And I've just actually done the work in the city I live in to find people that I really vibe with, you know. And also going to interesting conferences that are really relevant to me and the kind of culture that I want to be part of. Yeah, definitely taken a step away from social media in the last few years, that's for sure. That makes sense. It's hard to find a good community.

It is. I had to build one like both of the events that I go to in Portland um are ones that I created um partially because when I moved to Portland I didn't have any friends right I moved there December 2020 when nobody was accepting friendship applications and like I spent a lot of time, and I've moved from Europe, right? So basically by the time I finished work, everybody I knew was asleep, right? So I was super lonely. And then my friend, Jerry,

who's also a hardware hacker, moved to Portland as well. And we were like, we've got to find friends. How are we going to find friends? Like we're dying of loneliness and like frustrated geek geekiness um so we uh i started just hardware happy hour um and as just directly as a as a reason you know because i wanted to find friends nerdy friends in the neighborhood and you know what it really

really worked um i've met so many interesting people and seen so many cool projects just by doing just by setting up this event. And it doesn't actually take that much work to do. You just find a bar that is friendly to you and choose, you know, choose a day. Always Tuesday. Always choose Tuesdays. But it doesn't take a lot once you've set it up. And it really is such a rewarding thing to do and such a valuable thing to do, actually.

Yeah, human connections are very important. Yeah, they are. They are. It's easy to downplay the importance of meetups and community when it comes to technology. I think this idea of this lone genius sat at his computer, always at his, at his computer with his hoodie up typing on his own, but that's nonsense.

We learn from each other, and by coming together and sharing what we're working on, we're raising everybody's game, right? Thank you so much. Helenen do you have any thoughts you'd like to leave us with um i would like to um invite anybody who would like to to um to put in a proposal for teardown or just come along and hang out with us that would be dope um or if you're not local i would definitely encourage you to think about starting up a hardware happy hour if you don't feel like there's a lot of people in your location that you can talk nerdy with. Our guest has been Helen Lee, Head of Community at CrowdSupply.

Thanks, Helen. You're so welcome. Thank you for having me. Thank you to Christopher for producing and co-hosting. Thank you to our Patreon listeners Slack group for questions and to Memfault for their support. And of course, thank you for listening. You can always contact us at showitembedded.fm or hit the contact link on Embedded FM. And now a quote to leave you with from Charles Schultz. All his life, he tried to be a good person.

Many times, however, he failed. For after all, he was only human. He wasn't a dog.