Archives for "Events"
Ideas wanted: New X Prize offers $10 million for innovative oil spill cleanup solutions
Have an idea for how to clean up the massive amounts of oil spilling into the Gulf of Mexico? The X Prize Foundation (known for spurring technological advances through the offering of large sums of prize money) has announced a new challenge. The goal: innovative solutions for cleaning up the catastrophic oil spill in the Gulf. The prize: $10 million.
Francis Béland, vice president of prize development at the X Prize Foundation, announced the newest X Prize yesterday at the TEDxOilSpill conference in Washington, DC. Like other TED conferences, this one gathered some of “the world’s leading thinkers and doers for a series of talks, presentations and performances.” Topics at the conference included “mitigation of the spill and the impending cleanup efforts; energy alternatives; policy and economics; as well as new technology that can help us build a self-reliant culture.”
No word yet on whether BP will let the X Prize winner try to clean up the mess in the Gulf, but after reading Fast Company’s post about the 908 InnoCentive ideas the company refused to consider, it’s hard not to be skeptical.
Submit your ideas to francis@xprize.org. (And watch for more details in the coming weeks.)
Further reading:
Fast Company on the latest X Prize
Enter to win the MAKE/MakerBot 3D printer giveaway!
MAKE Magazine and Makerbot are holding a contest for the best design for a 3D-printable object, and the prize is a Deluxe CupCake CNC 3D Printer Kit.
From the MAKE magazine blog:
1. Imagine something you’d like to see printed on a MakerBot CupCake CNC!
2. Design your object using any 3D design software you like.
3. Upload your design to Thingiverse!
4. Share the link to your Thingiverse post here, in the comments, by May 5th, 2010 at noon PDT.
They’ve already got some great entries. Why not try your hand, 3D designers?
P.S. If you don’t have the time, inclination or skills to create a design, simply post your idea in the comments of the contest blog post for a chance to win 1 of 5 “Poor Person’s 3D Fabbing” prize packs, each containing:
- 1 Arduino Duemilanove board (courtesy of MakerBot) [Read more about the Arduino here.]
- 1 copy of MAKE, Volume 21, the Desktop Manufacturing issue
- 1 Maker’s Notebook (courtesy of Maker Shed)
- 1 package of Shapelock Design Plastic (courtesy of Maker Shed)
(Via boingboing)
Stanford Cool Product Expo – Wednesday, April 7
If you are in the Bay Area this week, stop by the Stanford Cool Product Expo (CPX) on Wednesday, April 7, 2010, from 12–6pm at the Stanford University Arrillaga Alumni Center. The Cool Product Expo is a free event showcasing more than 40 interesting products and projects from start-ups, university research labs, global manufacturers and local design studios.
Here’s how the CPX website describes the event: “The mission of the Stanford Cool Product Expo is to generate interest in and excitement around cool products and companies in the field of manufacturing and design at Stanford and the community at large…. The CPX is made possible through the efforts of the Stanford Product Design & Manufacturing Club (PDMC), the Product Realization Network at Stanford, and the Stanford Graduate School of Business.”
We are proud that this year’s lineup includes Arena customer Method Products, while customers Tesla Motors and d.light design have exhibited in the past.
If you can’t make it over to the event, check out the videos on the CPX website, where some of the exhibitors have posted previews using technology from CPX2010 exhibitor VideoGenie.
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