Moelcular Synth: snap-together electronic music instrument "bricks"

My 6-year-old and I love playing with our Stylophone, half-broken Casio keyboards, cheap-o effects pedals, and other tools for creating weird music. My young'n also goes deep into beginner DIY electronics with Snap Circuits, sets of modular components that can be combined in various ways to make neat noisemakers, games, water sensors, etc. Travis Feldman's Molecule Synth looks like terrific mix of all that! It's a collection of core synthesizer components that can be arranged and rearranged in different combinations to yield new sounds and new interfaces. It even has MIDI. Feldman already hit his Kickstarter goal with three weeks left to go on the fundraising. I can't wait for my son and I to get our hands on a set! Molecule Synth (Thanks, Mark Dery!)

David Pescovitz is Boing Boing's co-editor/managing partner. He's also a research director at Institute for the Future. On Instagram, he's @pesco.

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When you play it, you’ll shit “bricks”.
technogeekagain

Plus: It’s an interesting approach to configuring a modular synth.

Neutral: It’s missing many of the standard modular-synth modules. I presume those will come.

Minus: It’s pretty constrained compared to a traditional patchcable modular synth, or even one like the MiniMoog or ARP 2600 which has default normalized connections. The “atoms” can crowd each other out, there are limited connection points, and so on.

I love the idea of a modular synth as an educational tool. I’m just not sure this one’s limitations outweigh its physicality.
- dragonfrog
  
  It would be interesting if you could get blank templates to build your own modules – starting with a basic power plane, MIDI-CV, VCO, VCF, VCA, LFO, and audio output, a hex-tile-to-breadboard connector for prototyping, and a dozen or so blank tiles to build up.
  
  As soon as you build a single working module, you can immediately make use of it, so the reward of a single successful build is immediate.
- Robert
  
  I wonder if they could take it to the 3rd dimension to address the crowding problem.
- Boundegar
  
  Yea I got all excited and went looking for a price list, but there’s a TON of stuff missing. This seems more like a daydream than a business plan.
Spinkter

This is a great idea.

Start with this, then work your way up to big-iron modular.

Approved by those in the know!
http://www.zazzle.com/InfinitudeTortoises* An Infinitude of Tortoises

Wow, just imagine if W. Carlos had had a set of these back in the late 1960s! :-)
http://www.zazzle.com/InfinitudeTortoises* An Infinitude of Tortoises

Yep. Sorry to cause you to waste what was no doubt a very fine rant!

Speaking of Wendy (among my all-time favorite musicians), I note that her website hasn’t been updated since March 2009. I certainly hope she’s doing okay these days.