[Yaaarc] NotBAGO--of possible interest to robotics

[Dale Grover]

Hello all,

Spurred by a chance article about CerealBar, a breakfast meeting of 
(mostly web) geeks, I thought it would be nice to have a broader 
geek/techie meeting in the Ann Arbor area.  Details are below. 
Robotics topics would be certainly welcome, and I expect there'll be 
a solid group of folks into machining and other areas of potential 
interest to robot builders, though it won't be the 
all-robots-all-of-the-time of a YAAARC meeting.  As it is no longer 
at breakfast time, there will be no homemade granola :(
(Perhaps someone who attends YAAARC meetings more regularly than me 
could make a brief announcement at the NotBAGO meeting about YAAARC.)

--Dale
--------------


We had a fine time and half dozen folks at the first "Breakfast at 
Great Oak" last month, and many asked when we were going to do it 
again.  I've also heard that evenings would be much easier for many 
folks.  Let's try an evening meeting (hence Not Breakfast At Great 
Oak).

NotBAGO is a meeting for Ann Arbor area readers of Make Magazine, 
Circuit Cellar, Home Shop Machinist, Kevin Kelly's Cool Tools, 
slashdot, etc.  That is, people who are interested in and make things 
using technology, whether that's a metal cutting lathe or a Python 
script.  A kind of generalized mixture of CerealBar, DorkBot, Oxford 
Geek night, and Portland Machinist Guild.  We had machinists, 
electrical engineers, software folks, industrial control types, and 
so on.  The operative word is probably "eclectic."

The meeting starts with a brief go-around of introductions (name and 
what your interests are), then we have 5-minute presentations by 
whomever is motivated.  I hope we can also find some people to give 
longer talks, say 20 minutes, which we'd arrange in advance.  We had 
presentations last time about web-controlled home automation, 
industrial color sensing, computational software, unusual 
screwdrivers, and so on.  I'd love to see topics such as commercial 
Stirling engines (apparently there's a local company that makes 
them!), laser engraving/cutting, ethernet and 8-bit microcontrollers, 
instrumenting home energy and resource use (water, gas, electricity), 
and CNC, for example.  Basically, if it's about fabrication, 
networking, modification, design, electronics, metalworking, and 
tools, there's probably other folks in the audience who are 
interested.

A whiteboard, video projector (VGA, DVI, and analog), wi-fi, and 
copier (with advance notice) are available.

Where:  Same location as last time, the dining room at Great Oak 
Cohousing, on the west side of Ann Arbor (easy access to I-94). 
http://www.gocoho.org

When:  Date and time to be determined.  See step 2 below.

If you are interested, please do the following 2 things:

1.  Sign up for the Not Breakfast At Great Oak group at Yahoo (link 
below), which will act as an email list and easy place for common 
information.
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/notbago/join

2.  To help schedule the date of the next Not Breakfast at Great Oak, 
here's a link to a Meet-o-Matic page: 
http://www.meetomatic.com/respond.php?id=972067  This isn't a 
commitment, just an indication of when people can meet.  Assume 
meetings would be in the evening, probably at 8 pm.

Please feel free to invite other folks you think would be interested. 
Suggestions are also welcome.

That's all for now.

--Dale