Mark-it-ting’s power to paradoxically (and effectively) communicate via erasure was popularly demonstrated yesterday by several websites that “blacked out” their content as a means to protest SOPA/PIPA. (If you aren’t already familiar with these bills currently being considered by the U.S. Congress, please familiarize yourself. Or if you’re too lazy, just take our word for it: they suck. If passed, your favorite websites would disappear.)

But despite the negative connotation these sites’ “self-imposed censorship[s]” imply, we’re impressed by the flexibility of Mark-it-ting to work its magic in many contexts, in many ways. We’re also a little flattered given our prescience .

Here’s to the power of Mark-it-ting, the most effective way to add via subtraction!

Here’s some images from a recent spate of resuscitating previously unwearable shirts into one-of-a-kind, hand screen-printed, Sharism objets d’art.

Simply blot out the previous, unwanted logo and add your own.

Bam! A new shirt.

What looks like a messy white-out job turns out to be the coolest shirt in your closet.

Seriously, send us your shirts and we’ll send back a few revitalized with the Sharism and Fabricatorz logo as a thank you for giving life to otherwise dead and forgotten cotton.

I should note that the presentation title reflects popular interest in some of my topics, and not the specific words I would choose to represent what we are working on. In particular, we are staying away from using the words FREE, OPEN, COPYLEFT now in favor of Sharing, hence Sharism. Also, the word Hardware is a bit problematic because of what it conjures up for computer nerds as this an already manufactured piece of hardware, like the 400K iphones foxconn is churning out a day. We take it to mean more like the glass or metal that is part of a final product. To consider the Milkymist or our projects FROM CHINA is not completely accurate. While I spend a lot of time in China, the Milkymist in particular is manufactured mostly in Taiwan.

Oh well, words are words are words! Check out the slides below and please share. They are ✳ (shared by) me, aka: ✳ Fabricatorz.

(Click here for the SVG presentation or the SVG with outlines)

(Click here for the SVG presentation or the SVG with outlines)

Ask me about the event the next time you see me; I have some great stories to tell since this event was supposed to be mostly private during the conference.

In a more public showing, Yi from Qi Hardware is presenting about the Milkymist tonite (中文 at Xinchejian, the Shanghai-based hackerspace we held the first Sharism Presents Shanghai.

Don’t forget to Buy a Milkymist One for yourself or your friendz

A few of us made it to Miami Beach this year for the hoopla that is Art Basel. It’s always nice to drop in occasionally to see what the art world is up to, and glean what it deems hot or not. Not surprisingly, vulgarity still reigns large. But as I’ve noted elsewhere, hyper-superficiality can provide a breath of fresh air: making snap judgments based on whether or not something simply looks good is comforting in the same way that spending a December weekend in 80 degree weather is comforting.

Art Basel is definitely the most glamourous of all the art fairs that set up tent in Miami Beach, but several others created a strong buzz. Nada Art Fair, the free fair that focuses on smaller, independently-run galleries, is the younger, hipper and more tech-savvy alternative to Art Basel. The art at Nada wasn’t exactly impressive, but their events were far more eventful and exciting than those being hosted at Art Basel. I was able meet the people who run Bad At Sports, a dynamic group of people who do podcasts on contemporary art and had built a makeshift hut inside the lobby of the hotel where Nada was staged.

Almost as entertaining as crashing private cocktail parties that weekend was watching Miami Beach return to normal after everyone packed up and returned to their own private corners of the globe. Minus the influx of well-heeled visitors and sensational party buzz, Miami Beach felt almost as drab as the mannequin pictured above—blank and confused after being disrobed of all the designer garb.

Fabricatorz has sure leveled up and we are confident that more people will benefit from Gandi’s services. What really makes Gandi unique is its position of openness.

It is refreshing to be a customer since so many companies seem to wall us off from any kind of visibility into what the company is and does.

At Fabricatorz we appreciate transparency and honesty. Check Gandi’s company statement out:

Gandi is a premier, affordable, and ethical domain name registrar and innovative cloud hosting company that respects customer privacy and provides transparency in all its operations.

Offering a world-class alternative to purely commercial registrars, and a low-cost, innovative, cloud hosting platform, Gandi supports a community of people working on technology that enables the Internet for business, but also for the free and unrestricted sharing of information, and for promoting the respect of individual and human rights.

So far Gandi has helped us migrate Open Clip Art Library and is also working with our friendz over at Identi.ca and many others including innovative projects such as Gnome, World Wildlife Fund (WWF), and Debian.

Gandi’s service is impeccable, communication is prompt, and professionalism is consistent, we’re very happy to be supported by such a great host. Gandi truly lives up to their slogan, “No Bullshit”.

As you know the folks here at Fabricatorz have been collaborating with an international crew to develop and manufacture the Milkymist one. We’ve launching our new Milkymist website complete with a tutorial section. In addition to adding .jpeg support and more documentation, we’ve had users tell us how they used the Milkymist in a professional and educational atmosphere.

Recently architect Naihan Li has used the Milkymist to “perform” a presentation.

Free technology is beautiful. So get your own Milkymist today.

Mole-Girl and the Anamoos from Hsiao-Lan Wang on Vimeo.

Story by Mia Zajicek
December 2011

Video production assisted by Daniel Zajicek and Hsiao-Lan Wang

Our own Dan (aka tri-jack, aka zajicek, akak quadrajack) put together a great video with his daughter and wife. Please enjoy! (I think there is a happy holla-daze in there somewhere too btw)

Dan and his wife are both great contemporary composers living in Houston. We hope to do more great projects together soon. They remind me that to make a real company, especially long term, you have to have solid family and healthy growth.

Anyway, they have a great lil family and a cute kid! Here’s to the FabriZajicek family!

Great interview with Steve Jobs from back around 1995. A bit long, but an interesting read. I agree with much of what he says. He basically predicted, correctly, I think, that the main beneficiaries of the Web will be companies selling things. And also that no amount of technology can help education.

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/4.02/jobs_pr.html

“The desktop computer industry is dead.”

“The Web is not going to change the world, certainly not in the next 10 years. It’s going to augment the world.”

“The problem is I’m older now, I’m 40 years old, and this stuff doesn’t change the world. It really doesn’t. I’m sorry, it’s true. Having children really changes your view on these things. We’re born, we live for a brief instant, and we die. It’s been happening for a long time. Technology is not changing it much – if at all.”

“People are thinking less than they used to. It’s primarily because of television. People are reading less and they’re certainly thinking less. So, I don’t see most people using the Web to get more information. We’re already in information overload. No matter how much information the Web can dish out, most people get far more information than they can assimilate anyway.”

“I used to think that technology could help education. [...] No amount of technology will make a dent.”

Christopher from Fabricatorz designed the site from some various suggestions from Creative Commons CEO Cathy Casserly and board member Esther Wojcicki. Christopher wisely pushed to build the design on top of HTML5Boilerplate, so that the site would be stable across modern browsers and all the way back to IE 7 and above on Windows, since many Creative Commons website viewers use Internet Explorer on Windows.

Like Open Font Library, the site is also built using CSS media queries so the design is responsive to different devices from desktop to iPad to mobile phone. And, since the site is HTML5, its using the latest in stable open web technologies.

The above CC Search is now fully themed to fit in as well, with the entire Creative Commons website. This small portal actually gets a lot of traffic from the main Creative Commons website, so its important that it works decent and can be a lightpost illuminating the path to Creative Commons-licensed content.

Fabricatorz are available now for hire to build websites, web apps, convert your website to the future, translate your site into many different languages like Chinese and/or start from the bottom or top, and complete your project! We are lining up projects for 2012 fast. Let’s talk about how we can work together on your project.

Thanks to Xiaowu for taking a nice photo of the event. We had many great wine tastings from the excellent new wine club in Chaowai Soho, a Sharism supportive business. We had a few old friends and also some cool new people who live in Beijing came out like Alan Boyd, @imcherry and many more people in attendance. I also shared my new markiting project and heard great things from local investors, the progress of Yeeyan from akid, all while sampling some amazing South African wines.

See you soon at a next Sharism Presents Beijing!