Poco-Blog//

June 18, 2008

I am Jon.  I was born without an ‘h’—the doctors all said it wasn’t a big deal and that it happens sometimes.  So far so good.  We’ve got a John in our midst as well, so keep your wits about you.

I find that all great things in our world are a combination of other remarkable things.  We see this in condiments: thousand island dressing and tartar sauce, for example.  Who would have imagined that three of the primary condiments (ketchup, mayonnaise, and relish) could join forces so strongly to create such magnificent secondary condiments.  Mechatronics is also a confluence of primary ingredients: Mechanical Engineering (ME), Electrical Engineering (EE), and Computer Science (CS).  People say that mixed parents have the most attractive children.  I tend to agree; I believe Mechatronics is beautiful.

I grew up disassembling machines—lawnmower engines, bicycles, and VCRs—and trying to combine the pieces to build new machines (off-road motorized skateboards and pedal-powered wheelchairs--man, do i love wheelchairs!).  More than anything else, I loved seeing how these devices worked—linkages, motors, bearings, gears, grease, pulleys.  I was particularly drawn to mechanical systems, because I could actually see, touch, and smell the mechanisms. My interest in electronics and software came later (a circuit board doesn’t appear very exciting when you’re 10 years old, although those capacitors and ICs sure do resemble small cities) once I understood the invisible forces that make electrons do their dance.  And that brings us to the present....what a joy it is to once again be building electro-mechanical devices, only this time I’ve added business cards to my arsenal!  To me, Mechatronics is a way to be at the cutting edge of technology while still experiencing that rush of discovery I knew from my childhood.

I am looking forward to sharing my thoughts on interesting topics surrounding Pocobor, and I am eager to hear yours as well.

June 18, 2008

So me and the other PocoBits went rolling out deep last night to a DEMO event in the Richmond area of SF at a pretty nice little bar called Rockit Room.  We’ve been trying a number of these sorts of events out for networking purposes hoping to find some like-minded hardware folks but often without great success.  Last night was another example of a completely software-based gathering.  So if you’re looking for other engineers, DEMO is not your place.  If, however, you are looking for PR folks wanting to hype your web startup, then where were you last night?  Here’s a quick summary.

Pros

Open Bar - Its pretty hard to complain when free pints of Anchor Steam are flowing.
Well Attended - Maybe even too well attended.  Got a bit hot / crowded.

Cons

Software Only - Where are you badass hardware folks?
Band - Having a band in the largest room makes it impossible to talk and forces everyone into the smaller room.
Too Many Sales People - Too many folks looking to shill various services, not enough doing interesting things.

Anyways, thats the gist.  I’m actually curious as to what a web startup would even have been hoping to accomplish last night.  I didn’t see that many investors.  Anyone out there know?

June 17, 2008

My name is John, not to be confused with Jon. We like the name Jo(h)n around here, it keeps it interesting/confusing. I’m pretty dam excited about this blog – a place to post my voice and spread the gospel of mechatronics. I’ll start it all off with a little blurb about me.  I dig mechatronics – we get to play with electronics and make them do cool things in the REAL world. I’m a self-proclaimed tinkerer – why not take it apart? I like working in groups – nothing beats the energy in a brainstorm and you can’t really hi-five yourself (I’ve tried, not fun). And who doesn’t like a good hi-five? In the pocobor family, I’m probably the weird uncle – cracking random jokes at odd times and keeping things interesting or at least uncomfortable. That pretty much sums it up. Keep an eye on this blog – we play with knowledge, you’ll like it.

June 09, 2008

Hello world – my name is Brian and since this is my first blog post here, I guess I will introduce myself and also talk a little about why I am writing these posts.  I am one of the partners at Pocobor and my background is originally in mechanical engineering, but I have been pretty focused on mechatronics and embedded systems for the last few years.  Like the other bloggers here, I work full time as a mechatronics consultant / designer for Pocobor as well as working on some mechatronics side projects that I am interested in.  I also like robots.

Robot.

From a big picture perspective, I am writing about this kind of stuff because I am very excited about the potential for really cool and useful innovations associated with mechatronics.  I think that mechatronics (or integrated / embedded / electro-mechanical / [insert your pet terminology here] systems) is poised to change the way that we interact with the world.  The Jetsons have seen the Future, and its name is Mechatronics (just kidding… but not really). 

Cameron (one of the other partners and bloggers here) has a really interesting and much more detailed set of posts queued up for you that really dig into the ways that we see mechatronics changing the world and I don’t want to steal his thunder, but I told you I would try to answer the question “Why the hell does this blog exist?” The answer is: because we are deeply excited about the potential for mechatronics to make our lives more interesting, powerful, and happy.  (It would also be disingenuous not to add that we are excited about our company’s role in making that happen).

So that’s the big picture.  The question now becomes “How can one help along that process?” We think that one answer is to create a vibrant mechatronics online community to share and discuss ideas, plans, and results.  That is why we are adding our voice to forums like Mechatropolis, Mechatronics Zone and Bug Labs.  We hope that we can reach people who are, like us, interested in mechatronics and its applications.  We hope you will find some of our ideas and activities thought-provoking and especially that you will let us know what your reactions are. 

What kind of posts will be going up?  Personally, I’m planning a roster of posts ranging from big posts describing some of the work I’m doing to little notes about anything mechatronics-related that I find interesting or cool.  The first sequence of posts that I am working on will document the process of designing and building a device that will act as a lap counter for swimmers.  This is just a project that I am working on because it interests me and my goal is to let you know how I am going about designing and prototyping the device and also to solicit thoughts or suggestions on how to improve it.

Happy reading and please let me know what you think about the blog and its contents!

May 06, 2008

We are Pocobor.  This is our blog.

We have begun this exercise in futility because we believe we are standing at the forefront of a sea change in the tech world.  Specifically, we believe we are in the early stages of a shift in technological importance / excitement from software based projects to those that make use of hardware elements. 

As far as Pocobor is concerned, this will be a welcome shift.  We look forward to a time when eyeballs are no longer the most valuable commodity and sales are once again thrust into the spotlight of importance.  When we began Pocobor, we had been frustrated by the near Rodney Dangerfield levels of lack of respect paid to hardware innovations.  As engineers, we found it challenging to wrap our head around what we perceived to be outrageous valuations and we grew weary of pitching hardware concepts in a software-hungry valley.  Rounded Corners, CPMs, Gradients, and Social Networking carried little allure. 

As such, we founded Pocobor to provide ourselves with an outlet for our passion for hardware as well as a creative venue in which to drive innovations in Mechatronics design.  We now work on projects for some pretty badass clients as well as our own internal “Po-Jects” which we use to study different areas of Mechatronics, solve various annoying problems, and incubate startups.

As this undeniable shift lumbers on, we hope to provide a helpful voice and an intelligent forum to help ease the transition. 

Our Goals for this Blog:

-Provide a source of encouragement and advice for those interested in HW / Mechatronic projects / startups.
-Share our learning experiences from both client work and internal Po-Jects.
-Share our design and problem-solving processes
-Fuel a discussion on the future of hardware and its role with respect to the web and society
-Wrap an effective definition around this thing we call Mechatronics and make a case for its importance to the future of hardware development.