Ever wondered what to do with all those Amazon boxes you receive with consumable product goods (CPG) that nearly (ok all) readers receive. Sure the easy answer is to trot them thar boxes to the green recycling receptacle, flat ‘em and toss ‘em in without a second thought.
But there is another way and I learned it from the smarty PhD pants in Los Alamos, NM (home to the National Labs). Instead of recycling the cardboard boxes, how about reuse?
Welcome to the Maker Movement 2.0
It’s very simple and I don’t need 800+ words to lay it out. But seeing that a lot of my audience is in Texas and surrounding southern states, I’m going to go REAL SLOW.
Some historical context will set the table for this arts and crafts phenomenon. You can use those shipping boxes to create stuff. Creativity is a core pillar of the maker movement and I learned this when I partnered with well-respected SF Bay Area journalist Patrick Houston in a side-hustle startup called BizTech Experts while his day job was at Maker Media as an editorial guy after doing with Silicon Valley shuffle with tech industry stalwarts including Yahoo and CNET. My interactions with Patrick were ten years ago and Maker Media still has content and events.
Fast forward the movie a decade and the shipping card board box to art thang is what I call Maker Movement 2.0. And it’s being lead by Momma and Daddy bear to both educate and entertain all the bear cubs. That’s the use case I discovered when I double-clicked into this topic in Los Alamos where the art council hosts youth summer workshops see week five to learn more about it’s cardboard construction camp) with a learn-by-doing (the mantra at CalPoly where both of my boyz attained technical degrees) and it’s a Valium addiction buster for harried partners raising youngins. Another observation is that this is a hands-on laptop down, mobile phone off, zero screen time experience for all.
Before I share my photo essay of this topic to show you “Sup” evidence in the vein of if there aren’t pics it didn’t happen, this blog got me thinking about what could/should/would the Maker Movement 3.0 “look” like? I have my own biases and opinions here. In 4q2024 I was invited to join the Well Done Foundation family to support the plugin’ of orphan and abandoned oil and gas wells (these bad boys spew methane and other freaking nasty stuff into the atmosphere). We generate recyclable materials in the capping process. It’s above my pay grade but couldn’t these recyclables be turned into post-oil production art like jewelry and belt buckles? I’ll research it and get back to ya…what are your thoughts and ideas surrounding the Maker Movement. You know how to find me.
ACTION PLAN
Our experienced geek skills are necessary to drive this STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) movement. Search around your geography or start a meet-up mates!
Begin with the end in mind - NextGen Brelsford’s getting loud and proud about their creations.
And here is the B roll that shows how they did this. The next several pics are all about the behind-the-scenes of what I call the Maker Movement 2.0 universe.
