Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
This discussion however goes beyond virtual worlds and digital assets; between
2005 and 2008, physical and low cost devices for all were a dream coming true,
thanks to Arduino
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and RepRap.
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People from all over the world, with little to no
resources, would be able to create artefacts that until that moment would necessitate
highly expensive machines only available to the biggest world corporations. All
these new technologies have opened up complete new hands-on possibilities and,
together with the social networks, have been crucial in creating community ties, to
increase collaboration and participation, opening space for more elaborative cre-
ative technologies allowing in depth collaborative creation.
1.5
Traits of Creative Technologies
As we have seen from both previous points, cultural and technological, creative
technologies are strongly grounded in two ideas: facilitation for everyone and cre-
ation within environments of collaboration and participation. But these technolo-
gies still need to guarantee that they will be able to attract people willing to create,
because as Robinson (
2010
) and Csíkszentmihályi (
1990
) said, to engender creativ-
ity we need to be able to evoke passion and fun. Both emotions play an essential role
in pushing levels of self-motivation, dedication, and perseverance in the pursuing of
original creation. Having fun while playing (Brown
2010
) with creative technolo-
gies and fi nding new passions will guarantee the success of these new tools.
One example that encompasses all these ideas is
Scratch
. Its approach to visual
programming was able to embed programming knowledge into visual elements, in
a very easy approach. The embedded knowledge permitted users to enter the world
of programming and discover own interest in the beauty of logics without effort. But
Scratch
was not the fi rst tool to put programming in a visual and embedded form;
then why all this success? We believe that great deal of the success was achieved,
thanks to the
Scratch
community, which was designed with participatory culture in
mind. Hence, the easiest way to publish work created in
Scratch
is through the
Scratch
website, but more interesting than this is the openness of
Scratch
projects in
their library. Anyone in the community can download and open any project in the
Scratch library. This means that any person in the community can use code made by
others and assets created by others. This means that whenever someone doesn't
know how to code something, they just need to go to the library and look for an
example matching his interests. If someone doesn't know how to draw, or how to
create sounds, they can use them from other artworks in the library. Scratch is a
creative technology in all senses, because it not only makes it easier through embed-
ded knowledge but also through sharing knowledge. Due to the tool being free plus
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For more details on the building of Arduino, watch the “Arduino The Documentary” (2010) at
http://arduinothedocumentary.org
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RepRap is a concept defi ned as the replicating rapid prototype, a 3D printer, developed by Adrian
Bowyer. More about the project at
http://reprap.org
