HOWTO Make a steampunk MP3 player
Porkshanks has posted a detailed HOWTO on Instructables explaining how to build his sweet little "Ambience Enhancer" steampunk MP3 player (featured here last month).
Link (via Gizmodo)
This handy little device can take the most boring and dull locale and turn it into whatever sort of emotive resonance you prefer! You simply load it with "Wave Files" or their less complicated cousins the "Musical Programme Type Threes (or "MP3" for those who enjoy abbreviations) and then activate the device to change the ambience around you! Astounding!The Ambience Enhancer project that I am going to share with you is a basic but beautiful looking retro-futuristic style cover for anything you'd like it be, although I built mine as an MP3 Player Cover, you could build a watch, a cellphone cover, or even a PDA into it. Its totally up to you! Use your imagination...
the latest
latest episodes
Astonishing! Something to occupy me whilst I perambulate in the evenings.
is anyone else sick of Steampunk yet or it just me?
Or you could buy a ZUne, those things already look 150 years out of date.
I'm with THEMAGUS - Cory, angel, can your 2008 resolution be to give this whole steampunk thing a rest?
Of course, I could just GreaseMonkey the steampunk posts into oblivion, couldn't I? Never mind.
bxrguy-
Thanks for the great idea. I too don't like Steampunk, but when I read these posts I learn about all kinds of new toys like GreaseMonkey.
Or rather, post things that are actually steampunk?
Slapping some brass and leather on an everyday object doesn't make it steampunk. Steam engines do.
I'm ever amused by the flavor of totally loony comment that steampunk items brings out, which falls into two camps:
1. You're giving out the wrong flavor of free ice-cream. I know that this is a site where you write about the stuff that interests you, but it would be nice if you were interested in different things. You see, I've hallucinated this set of editorial guidelines for you, and you're violating them. OBEY MY HALLUCINATION! I AM THE ALMIGHTY CUSTOMER AND YOU SHOULD BE INTERESTED IN OTHER THINGS! Also, Boing Boing was better before (Call of the wild hipster: "THEIR FIRST ALBUM WAS BETTER!")
2. This isn't really steampunk. I know what steampunk is. I was there, in Bruce Sterling's home office in Austin, toiling with him to modem his latest contribution to THE DIFFERENCE ENGINE to Bill Gibson in Vancouver -- I helped Mike Godwin wire up the modems! And I know from steampunk. It has steam engines. That's exactly what Bruce was thinking, that day. He leaned back, took off his glasses, rubbed the bridge of his nose and drawled, "Hey, Chevan, you know what, people are going to get this all wrong. It's not steampunk unless it has a steam engine. I'm putting you in charge kid, you go out there and school them all. Any time someone makes something that delights the maker and the world, I want you there, shitting on them from a great height, dropping turds labelled, IT'S NOT STEAMPUNK IF IT DOESN'T HAVE A STEAM ENGINE. If they're not making ACTUAL FUCKING LOCOMOTIVES, I want you to give them what-for. OK?"
Merry xmas to you too.
Molly's going to be doing a step by step write-up of the headphone mod for a guest-artist spot on the Steampunk Workshop site.
The story should be up sometime in January so check in on http://steampunkworkshop.com and see how to make your own pair of "shanks"!
@CORY - Merry xmas to you too and I hope you had a marvelous Solstice!
I seem to have done the impossible. Cory, I always thought you were unflappable and above petty internet fights.
Nice passive aggressive comeback, by the way. I'm ever amused by the ways that people get defensive when not everyone likes their treasured hobbies and bitching-hot stylings. And a merry xmas to you, too.
And here's some conciliation: I really am sorry I came off as an asshole, but I do have a reason. Steampunk is awesome, and I fucking love it to death. But do you have any idea how often someone will come into the proverbial internet room brandishing something with the slightest amount of brass highlights, screaming "LOLZ, IT'S STEAMPUNK. LOOK GUYS, AREN'T I SUPER-SPECIAL-AWESOME COOL?" Eventually, everyone else starts to develop an abrasive, knee-jerk reaction to that kind of thing. In hindsight, that's not a good thing.
The "steampunk has steam engines" thing is, as you've intimated, NOT a concrete rule. I'll admit that. I was wrong.
Sorry, and this time with sincerity, have a merry Christmas.
Actually, Cory followed my imaginary editorial rule for steampunk. He in no way referenced the dreaded mainstream.
Any mention of the popularization of our beloved genre/style/concept/movement/lifestyle causes tremendous spasms of non-conformist angst. I, for one, am glad to be back to arguing about the steam.
Molly's work rocks no matter what we call it.
I don't care for all of this steampunk business either...the dead horse has been flogged into oblivion.
And since we visitors are what drives this blog (and the financial bottom-line underneath it) we have more than a right to complain and to be-yotch about the content.
It's a give and take sitch-er-ation.
Father Brown, the free ice-cream is made according to our taste, and the choice is like it, ignore it, or eat someone else's ice-cream. But we're not your freelance writing team, here to be directed by a committee of thousands in the hopes of pleasing them. If you think that reading what I publish makes you "part of my bottom line" and "gives you the right to complain," I think you've gravely misunderstood the nature of blog publishing.
Boing Boing's mandate is to report on the stuff that interests us, for people who share our interests (enough that it's worth reading for them). If you want a magazine, there's plenty out there on the stands, and they'll try their damndest to please you.
That's in the nature of blogs and it's what makes them great. Their writers get to cover their subjects in as much depth as they care to, and no more. It's nice to hear from people about shared passions, but I'm not only disinterested in hearing about what you dislike about my interests, I'd actually prefer that you not tell me about it -- I'm not going to be less interested in a subject because you dislike it, period, end of story. And I'm not going to stop writing about my interests, nor write about things I'm not interested in, no matter what. Your "right" to complain about it amounts to the "right" to show up at a dinner party and divert the conversation by interrupting and saying "No, that's boring, talk about something else."
And I think that showing up ON Boing Boing to complain about the free ice cream is in the worst possible taste.
Note that this doesn't mean that we don't want good, vigorous discussion about the subjects we post about -- but there's a universe of difference between "I disagree for these reasons' and "this is boring, stop writing about it." The latter is in the list of "five most rude things to leave as a blog comment."
I for one like the steampunk posts. They're often here first before they show up on the livejournal community.
I gritted my teeth as I clicked for this Steampunk link.
I said to myself,
"This thing better run on some damned steam, or this is it."
BoingBoing at large, why are the artifacts of this "Steam punk" movement so frequently "steam Poseur"?
Some gold paint, some wacky old detailing, I get it. It's 'Neat-o' to the people to which these old things are exceedingly distant and unreal.. Have fun with it. Get where you need it to get you, but this "steam" stuff was running the Industrial Revoloution. We're living in the 21st Century, and we can do phenomonal things in our yards and kitchens.
Why the all-too-common gold paint and phony backstory?
Is it just a fantasy thing, and not truly technologically driven? A prop fetish?
Is there a FAQ?
Cory, thank you! You said what I always think, more eloquently than I could. (And from a position of authority here, too!) I couldn't agree with your position wrt the flavor of the free ice cream.
Itomato, (a) read Cory's post, and (b) "steam punk" does not == "steam powered." If you read "steam punk" as "steam powered," you've got reading comprehension problems. By way of example, a "greaser" doesn't have to put actual grease in his hair.
Itomato: Of course it is fantasy, fashion, an aesthetic! Like any fashion it's about creating uniqueness and visual appeal and maybe even a personal statement through form rather than function, for things where function is already well solved and commoditized -- the same impulse as aftermarket auto flash, or elaborate dinner service, or even t-shirt decals. That's the "punk" part, a reminder that really it's a fashion statement and not a technological trend.
Now I bet someone is going to dig up a bit of some kind of steampunky gadget that actually uses boiled water instead of electricity for some common task, to which I say: though awesome, that's still clearly a deliberately retro-functional statement.
Hmmm. Putting a faux victorian sleeve on a modern (and therefore semi-disposible) gadget seems to me like a bizarre waste of time. Inelegant. It's just - FAKE! A little smirking joke. I... just... don't... get it! But I guess that's my problem.
But talking of steampunk - I hope everyone that digs that particular sub-genre has read Keith Roberts's Pavane. Beautiful book.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Pavane-Millennium-SF-Masterworks-S/dp/1857989376/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1198621039&sr=1-1
"I'm ever amused by the flavor of totally loony comment that steampunk items brings out..."
Cory, you spelled "homicidally enraged" wrong.
PS. Did someone say something about some free ice cream??