With free adapter kit, Legos can mate with Tinker Toys, Zoob
Posted on | March 21, 2012 | Comments Off
(Credit: F.A.T. Lab, Sy-Lab)
Legos are cool. Tinker Toys are cool. Zoob is cool. But you know what's really cool? Building a hybrid gizmo out of all of the above (and other construction toys as well).
That's possible now--without tape, glue, chewing gum, or earwax--using the Free Universal Construction Kit, a set of adapters that let you snap together parts from 10 popular building toys. Brought to you by the F.A.T. (Free Art and Technology) Lab and Sy-Lab, the kit can be downloaded for free as a collection of models in STL format that can be printed with 3D printers such as the Makerbot.
Aside from the simple, flat-out coolness of letting you create mashups with your different toys, the kit manifests certain highfalutin philosophical ideas about proprietary systems, mass culture, and the DIY mind-set. As F.A.T. puts it:
By allowing any piece to join to any other, the Kit encourages totally new forms of intercourse between otherwise closed systems--enabling radically hybrid constructive play, the creation of previously impossible designs, and... [Read more]
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