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Maker Faire

San Mateo Fairgrounds
May 4, 2008

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Where to start, with the Maker Faire?

It was pretty cool to see that the Faire has become so popular that there was a half mile backup geting off the 101. Maybe it had something to do with stories on NPR and in The Economist.

And it was a neat surprise to find a dozen Disney Imagineers showing off cool stuff in a little hallway that Pixar had rented to promote this summer's release of Wall-E. Em got to grill the imagineers on what they had studied to become imagineers, and Ellie won a small video camera in a trivia contest.

And it was pretty cool to see my own image blown up on the cover of Make magazine -- the result of the recent photo shoot.

We saw steam punks get married, and Em got to help with the life-sized mouse trap. We even saw the Eepy Bird guys perform live their world famous Diet Coke & Mentos fountains.

But of all the things I saw people Making, none was more amazing than the feat pulled off by those who made the Faire. It was really neat to see two friends and former colleagues -- my fellow editor Shawn, and my old boss and mentor Dale -- enjoying the fruits of their labors and basking in the glow of success. Were it not for their ideas and efforts, none of the 80,000 folks present would be having the blast that they obviously were having. Now that's really making something worthwhile.