Creativity Summit a success + fundraising

Congrats and many thanks to our fine former Mayor of Tulsa, the honorable Rodger Randle.  The day which he and his comrades (Kevin O'Connor and Philbrook notably) organized was a great success with over 150 registrants and a day of stimulating conversation.  The topics ranged from art to theatre to education to business.

My talk on Fab Lab's was well received.  Our panel on rating Tulsa's creativity involved an artist, a journalist, a poet and myself.  Being one of the few technology guys in the room was a bit daunting but altogether exciting.

I can't say enough good things...the keynote speaker Nate Bliss, the lunch speaker Robert Sternberg, and the afternoon speaker Randall Suffolk were fantastic.  I was really struck by a statement by Randall, which was this "If you dislike change, you're going to hate irrelevance."

This really struck a nerve with me in my life, especially launching a new organization and plowing new ground in Tulsa.  It's all about relevance, and one of the chief motivations of our Fab Lab Tulsa team is to make our fair city and state more relevant in the days and years to come.

In closing, the event was great and I was honored to participate in the first one.  For a great audio piece, here's a link to a radio story on the event here.  Note that I can't control this audio link and I don't know how long it will be available.

Oh, yeah...if you want to come visit Fab Lab Tulsa, contact me.  My digits and email are on our website.  I'm always happy to give tours, especially if you're interested in making a donation!

More thoughts on creativity

As I continue preparation for the Tulsa creativity summit, I'm thinking more about the "ingredients" for creativity than I am about the products of creativity.  Products might include, but are not limited to:

• patent filings and awards
• business start-ups
• art galleries and shows
• live music shows
• museums
• theater productions

I'm trying to assemble a list of what it takes to spur creativity, which is not nearly so obvious.  I've done a little reading lately on the topic and here are some musings, just for fun...

1. Creativity, I believe, is a process through which people solve an identified problem...be it an abstract problem, an aesthetic problem, an industrial problem or mere boredom.  So then, an ingredient of creativity would be the existence of interesting or compelling problems.  Oklahoma (fortunately or not) has an abundance of those.
2. Effective tools, skills or intuition for identifying the root causes of problems.
3. A "go for it" attitude.  Creativity bears fruit in action.
4. Failure tolerance.  Taking calculated risks...again and again and again...in order to really "go for it".  It's about getting the support you need to try one more time after things fall apart.
5. Opportunities to act upon creative instincts.  In my case, it would Fab Lab Tulsa...which is so much more than a place to collaborate.  Fab Lab Tulsa is a place to turn ideas into reality.  If you're supposed to "go for it" then you've gotta have a place to do that.

That's all for now.  I'm a little tapped out after an amazing Book Smart event last night.  See the next post!

More on creativity + ShopBot + 3D Printer

The website for Tulsa's Creativity Summit was just launched here.  Register now.  Looks to be a fun day hosted at Circle Cinema.

So Fab Lab Tulsa's shopbot is up and running now.  It took a few days longer than expected because the electrician who helped do the renovation was rather busy.  All that said, it's operational.  We're just squaring the machine and getting it set-up.

We're really lucky...who knew there was Shopbot user community in Tulsa, OK?  I didn't.  It turns out there are quite a few local users, one of whom is already developing beginning, intermediate and advanced classes for us.  His name is Dana Swift...when you meet him thank him for his help.

Lastly, our Objet 3D Printer arrived yesterday.  It's still in the crate because Objet is really strict about the set-up.  That should be done next week.  It's a pretty sweet piece of equipment and I'm exciting to begin using it.  By the way, I've been remiss...I need to recognize Engatech...they're a local engineering consulting firm who also sells Objet printers.  They made an amazing contribution by arranging for the donation of our 3D Printer!  Isn't that awesome?!  Special thanks to Clay Slaton and his team.