TED2012: littleBits creator Ayah Bdeir

[Video Link] Ayah Bdeir is the founder and lead engineer of littleBits, an open source library of electronic modules that snap together with tiny magnets for prototyping and play. littleBits won Popular Science's "Best of Toy Fair 2012" and Ayah was named a TED Fellow this year. I interviewed her this morning at TED2012 in Long Beach, CA.

See all my TED2012 coverage here.

• [Vengefultacos]

  The littlebits link… is busted.

• [simonbarsinister]

  I met Ayeh at a Maker Faire. She was very nice and I thought the idea was fantastic. My young kids are homeschooled and I’m getting these for them to play with electronics without having to learn to solder & plan resistors and capacitors (yet).

• [Hugh Johnson]

  Smart, and beautiful.
  You had me at “microcontroller progamming”…rarr.
  I’m in love.
  Sigh.

• [misterx001]

  Poor thing. If she had a dollar for every sincere proposal of marriage I’m certain she’s gotten from throngs of hapless neckbeards she’d have more than enough funding for any project she could imagine.

• [robuluz]

  Mark continues to find the awesome at TED.

  Combine this with the neuroscience kit from the other day for genuine mad science. Great stuff.

• [pthree]

  Those look really awesome. They remind me a lot of logiblocs, which I had as a kid, but a bit more sophisticated.

• [CLamb]

  I’m happy to See Miss Bdeir is getting recognition for her great work.  I first met her at the Open Hardware Summit, of which she is a founder.

• [TimRowledge]

  It’s really nice to see young women getting into the maker/hacker/whatever sphere. Maybe eventually there will be enough to stop the stupid sexism that seems to flourish wherever the crowd is dominantly male. Perhaps before the heat death of the universe things will finally approach civility.

  • [robuluz]

    If not before, then certainly after.

  • [hexmonkey]

     Is it sexist to say that she’s beautiful?