Friday event proposal: Project/Idea critique night

[cibomahto]

In a discussion with Forest this weekend, we came upon the idea of holding a project critique night. The plan is that you bring a project idea that you have been thinking about making, share it with the group, and then we talk about it as a group. If you've got the seed for an idea that you have just thought of, or have already started working on something and would like some feedback, than this is the event for you. The idea is for this to be a fairly informal session, and we'll keep it positive, so you should definitely bring yourself and your dreams, and we will help figure out how to make them happen!

Note that this is different from pitch night, because the goal isn't to find collaborators, but to help you refine your projects. Of course, group projects are welcome too!

Anyone interested? Got a better idea how to run this? Lets hear it!

[schmarty]

I like it! This could be a really fun event (and doesn't necessarily need to be Friday, unless we specifically want to include non-members).

What scope do you have in mind for each presentation/brainstorming session?

I can think of some project ideas where it takes me ~5 minutes to explain and 10 minutes of smart people brainstorming would get it well underway. On the other hand, I have some things that could take hours to explain and days of research to unstick.

[cibomahto]

Oh, good point, it could be a different night, I forget that we can have official programming other times . It's also more of a working thing, so i could see it being better to do on, say, a Wednesday.

I'm open to the size and scope of presentations, as long as the idea can be summed up in a quick elevator-pitch style. I'm suspecting that it would probably work best for smaller things, but we should definitely try a few things out.

[sporksmith]

Good idea! Come to think of it, we did something like this in MESH (Michigan Engineering Software and Hardware) pretty regularly. It's a lot of fun to hear about what other people are up to, and the insights you get from others can be a huge help. Actually, in the case of MESH, we had weekly meetings where we would just go around the table and everyone would at least briefly say what they've been up to. It could be as short as "still working on X", or you could go into some detail or demo if you wanted. It wasn't very structured, but it worked fine in that case (for around 5-8 people). Maybe we could even get in the habit of doing this for ~10 minutes at some designated time during the 'main' shop hours? Or maybe just before or just after the bimonthly member meetings?

I do also like the idea of doing a longer and more structured version of this, as you suggest. I think that even for this relatively short time slots would be the way to go. 5-10 minutes for presentation and 5-10 minutes for q&a sounds pretty good. Maybe 30 minutes all together on the outside. Longer than that and things would start to drag. For hairier problems, boil it down to fit in the time slot, and people who are interested in hashing it out in more detail can follow-up with you later.

[cibomahto]

Ok, so to start this off them, let's go with three people and 30 minutes, and each person gets 5 minutes to talk and 5 minutes of critique. How about, say, Wednesday, November 11th, at 6:30? Respond if you are interested

[Dan Sullivan]

I'm interested. I think the formal presentations and formal critiques could be early, and then people could discuss things informally afterward. This would be easier if there were a separate discussion area for each project. The place is so big that separating the discussions should be easy enough.

[Dan Sullivan]

It also occurred to me that we might advertise the projects in advance to members who might be interested, mostly via these forums.

[cibomahto]

Awesome! So far, we have two people lined up to present an idea. Would you be interested as well?

[Dan Sullivan]

Awesome! So far, we have two people lined up to present an idea. Would you be interested as well?

I could make a presentation on my e-bike project and on e-bikes in general, but I could also wait if others have something.

[cibomahto]

That would be great- is there a specific idea or issue that you can carve out of the larger project, that would be possible to talk about in a short time? We're still looking for one or two presenters, so if you have something it would be great!

[MattStultz]

As an update to this post it's worth noting this has been changed to a Wednesday night event for members instead of a Friday night open event. If you would like to participate and you are not yet a member please remember to sign up for membership here http://www.hackpittsburgh.org/?page_id=9.

[Forest]

I can't take any credit for this event, but I'm excited to participate and hear about other people's project ideas. I'll be presenting on my bicycle-powered subwoofer project. Sorry, no electronics or programming involved; it's an interactive mechanical-acoustical device.