EcoHackNYC II starting this Friday night

[Liz Barry]

Dear all, 

This Friday evening, and all day Saturday and Sunday, an incredible group of folks and orgs will be getting together to hack software and hardware for the environment. "EcoHack" is a public, free event hosted at Parsons the New School for Design -- 6 E. 16th street, 12th floor, Manhattan.

Details and partners listed at echacknyc.org.

There will be many inspiring (short) talks to hear on Friday night, and fun project teams to join on Saturday. While there will be much technical development of all stripes happening, technical skill is *not* required and there is much to contribute by all! 

Did we mention that we're going to be adapting 18th Century military technology for stabilized balloons that orient with wind direction, with the goal of lifting air quality sensors into the sky above NYC and beyond? We are bringing a sewing machine for creating a lifting body case for our standard spherical balloons. 

For those of you out of town it would be awesome to hear what you think generally & specifically of monitoring and broadcasting air quality, or adding additional tethers around the "equator" of our standard 5'5" red balloon, or any other ideas.

Best!
Liz

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@lizbarry

[Liz Barry]

Hi all, 

EcoHack went great this weekend! Thanks to all who came out, it was a great diversity of Public Lab folks and new members. 

Folks from Public Lab and the Sensemake.rs crew worked together on the air column monitor, including wirelessly broadcasting sensors suspended from a lenticular balloon with tail fin. Check out the Research Notes: 

http://publiclaboratory.org/notes/air-column-monitor

More reporting later once the pictures and videos are up somewhere. 

Liz

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@lizbarry

[Liz Barry]

Hi all, 

Lots of pictures have been posted form this event, check out the #Sensemakers collection on Meetup: http://www.meetup.com/sensemakers/photos/7623932/

and Shannon's collection on flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/recordandremember/sets/72157629537600846/

The air quality sensor flew again yesterday at lunch during a demo with some visualization experts. Thanks to Leif and Joe, and especially to the #Sensemakers community for sponsoring helium. 

Liz

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@lizbarry