Free As In Dirt: Why Matter Matters for Open Hardware

“Open hardware” is a difficult name. First, most designs are limited to caseless electronic circuitboards — hardly full-fledged products. Second, most “open” designs rely heavily on pre-fabricated components made using inaccessible methods — try making your own steel, plastic, or resistors, let alone ICs, or LCD screen assemblies. The power of open hardware is the power to give root access to all makers for all objects — not just assemblies of complex parts. This talk will discuss strategies in design, community building, and information sharing which enable more truly open designs of more broadly defined objects.

About Dominic Muren
Dominic Muren is a designer working to push manufacturing toward smaller, smarter, more localized and flexible micro-fabtories. He edits Humblefacture.com — a blog exploring a future where more nimble, humble manufacture is normal. He is prototyping this future in the work of his design practice, The Humblefactory, for which he was named a 2010 TED Global fellow, and 2011 Poptech Social Innovation Fellow. His most recent project is Alchematter.org, an online maker space for sharing and remixing open source designs for everything.