Re: [ox-en] Open Source in robotic micro air vehicles
- From: Stefan Merten <smerten oekonux.de>
- Date: Mon, 02 Aug 2010 10:32:43 +0200
Hi all!
Yesterday Thomas v Loeffelholz wrote:
I'd like to add this one:
[...]
I wonder what we can learn from examples like this. Especially since
some people are so keen to implement / see peer production for
physical products.
Here are a few points which I think are important:
* "Sexy" topic
The topic of such flying robots is obviously pretty sexy for a
couple of (technical) people. Though I'm not into this kind of stuff
I can fully understand this. It's certainly an interesting challenge
to build machines which can fly autonomously and do useful things.
This challenge is certainly an important part of Selbstentfaltung.
* Low entry barrier for experiments
Actually the article I read consisted of two parts. The other part
was about big so-called unmanned air vehicles (UAV) which usually
fly very high and for a long time. These seem to have primarily
military uses and are quite big and (thus) quite expensive. The
article did not talk about open source in this field.
For the MAVs there are pretty cheap kits which are cheap enough for
hobbyists. Of course there are companies selling such kits but I can
not see a problem with this.
To put it more theoretically: The means of productions are cheap
enough for hobbyists.
* Option to persue own experiments
The mentioned kits allow for own experiments. I don't know this in
detail but AFAICS the software running on these MAVs is the key
factor and it is easy to modify the software and try it out
practically.
If that option would not be built into the mentioned kits the
Selbstentfaltung mentioned above would have no chance to be lived
practically. Thus I think such an open platform inviting experiments
is really crucial.
* A medium to network
Of course for building a community you need a medium to build it in.
Of course today the Internet with it's various facilities is the
platform to build this [1]_.
.. [1] When I googled for this topic I wanted to find such a
community site. I didn't find one - which doesn't mean that
it doesn't exist. But may be it's the wrong approach to find
a dedicated MAV open source community site. The various
project communities are probably enough.
Similar points seem to apply for fabbers but also for other topics.
IIRC I once posted a similar posting about open source rockets.
All in all all the points above are very similar to Free Software.
Though Free Software existed before the Internet had matured it really
rocketed when personal computers and the Internet became available for
hobbyists.
I put these points to
http://en.wiki.oekonux.org/Oekonux/DrawingBoard
Grüße
Stefan