Where technology and craft meets.

Business Proposal

By: Ambreen Hussain& Jennifer Dopazo

Snaps and Pins was made as a result of two crafters and geeks, Jennifer Dopazo and Ambreen Hussain, who wanted to keep their hands and minds busy with simple experiments in craft technologies. As both graduates of the MFA Design & Technology program at Parsons, they started their passion of electronics and soft circuitry in their theses discoveries.

Jennifer’s thesis, Tikos, were three interactive toys that helped preschoolers learn numbers. Ambreen’s thesis, Spin on the Waltz, were two garments for both male and female Viennese waltz dancersthat created an interactive sound environment for a new form of dancing. Both spent a majority of their time sewing and coding, and it is in the combination of these two interests and projects that the blog came about. Yet that first year was a huge learning curve, and much of it was trying to find a starting point that had it all. How could we learn how to sew? Where could we go to find an outlet or forum for the basics for soft circuits? How would we ever find a resource on electronics that didn't look like it was speaking Yiddish to us?

This blog is dedicated to those individuals who were stuck at some point in their lives and knew what their passions were, either in crafting or circuitry, or better yet, both, but had no means to find a resource to get them started. I guess you could say, feel free to assimilate this site as a Crafting Technology blog for dummies.

We keep things simple. That was our tactic throughout our thesis projects and learning process, and we try to keep this principle and philosophy alive in this blog as well. We believe that crafting is easy, seamless and fun. That ideas can be as well. That clean and sophisticated design is approachable. That new platforms are hard to jump into, but they shouldn't be. We acknowledge that a well-developed product had a starting point. We hope that starting point is here.

MISSION STATEMENT

RESEARCH STATISTICS

FUNDAMENTAL PROBLEM

In many design schools and at Parsons, soft electronics, meaning the combination of using soft, cloth-like fabrics and materials in conjunction with electronics is now commonly becoming a form of communication.The general consensus, however, in these design schools is that students should already be familiar with the basics, and theassumption is that there is a forum for Lilypad users and soft electronic users - there is not.

Similarly, craft blogs, like instructable, give you how-tos on sewing, but they forget that some users are not aware of the fundamental basics of stitching styles, and even lack knowledge of materials and fabrics thatare being used. We dig deeper and start from point A.

USER GROUP

AGE:late teens to early thirties

GENDER:predominantly female, though we welcome male enthusiasts as well

TWO NICHES:craft enthusiastssoft electronic enthusiasts

COMMON HOBBIES:level 1 learners, hand-makers, crafters, “geek chic” electronic and robotic users, Arduino/Lilypad fans

PRECEDENTS

ETSY --- Community-driven website that targets the buying and selling of crafts. Provides how-toson the basics of selling and from time-to-time, crafts. Targets a huge crowd of crafters and theirsupporters.

INSTRUCTABLES. --- Community-driven website filled with various instruction sets of all kinds. Targets a number of learners and instructors.

IHEARTSWITCH --- website dedicated to theinformation of fashionable technology. Specificallyfor users of a smaller niche of people.

BLOG FORMAT

CYCLES

The blog will run in a form of cycles and phases. These essentially will be partitioned to three which entail :

• Cycle 1 :a craft component

• Cycle 2: a circuitry component

• Cycle 3: a combination of the two

WITHIN EACH CYCLE

Each cycle will contain levels of “easier” orbasic offsets and progress to more rigourous levels

COMPONENTS OF CODE

Cycles 2 and 3 will contain code once theyobtain to higher levels.

CASE STUDIES

The inclusion of case studies, within a variety of categories (ie. material studies,did you know, we are currently obsessedwith, etc.) will always be a continuous component within each cycled phase

FAVORABLE MATERIALS

• Arduino - default for grasping the basicsof physical computing and rapid prototyping

• Lilypad - sizable/suitable for on surfacematerials

• felt - easy surface to shape, sew

• snaps - easy for connections

•• Refer to next pages to find visuals of cycles,sample text and look and feel of blog

CYCLE 1 - CRAFTING TECHNIQUE

CYCLE 2 - PHYSICAL COMPUTINGTECHNIQUE

CYCLE 2.1 - PHYSICAL COMPUTING+ CODE TECHNIQUE

CYCLE 3 - SOFT CIRCUITRY(CRAFT + PHYSICALCOMPUTING TECHNIQUE)

CYCLE 3.1 - SOFT CIRCUIT(CRAFT + PHYSICALCOMPUTING TECHNIQUE)+ CODE

stitching

cross-stitching

knitting

crochet

currently obsessed -aprons

using the sewing machine

sewing patterns

did you know? -DIY evolution

did you know? -history of soft comp.

material studies

soft circuit switch

soft circuit switch -2

soft circuit switch w/MC

soft circuit switch coding MC -Lilypad

photos for inspiration

basic LED circuit

basic LED circuitw/switch

2-3 LEDs w/switch

intro to Arduino

intro to Lilypad

1-2 sample codes

CYCLE/STEP 1 - CRAFTING TECHNIQUE

CYCLE/STEP 2 - PHYSICAL COMPUTINGTECHNIQUE

CYCLE/STEP 2.1 - PHYSICAL COMPUTING+ CODE TECHNIQUE

CYCLE/STEP 3 - SOFT CIRCUITRY(CRAFT + PHYSICALCOMPUTING TECHNIQUE)

CYCLE/STEP 3.1 - SOFT CIRCUIT(CRAFT + PHYSICALCOMPUTING TECHNIQUE)+ CODE

stitching cross-stitching

knitting crochet

current obsess -aprons

using the sewing machinesewing patterns

did you know? -DIY evolution

did you know? -soft comp.

material studies

interview w/Alison Lewis How-to video

How-to video

Twitter Q&A

Viral EventOverview

soft circuit switch

soft circuit switch -2

soft circuit switch w/MC

soft circuit with Lilypad

photos for inspiration

basic LED circuit

basic circuitw/switch

2-3 LEDs w/switch

intro to Arduino intro to Lilypad 1-2 sample codes

How-to video

EASIER TASK HARDER TASK MARKETING CONTEXTUALIZE

TEMPLATES-- LOOK AND FEEL

Categories CSS

SAMPLE CONTEXT

“Soft computation:” is the design of digital and electronic technology that is composed of soft materials such as textiles and yarns, as wellas predicated on traditional textile construction methods to create interactive physical designs. The term was coined by Joana Berkowska who also states: One application of reactive fashionis to enable the idea of changing our skin, our identity, and our cultural context.... Idevelop enabling technology for electronic textiles based upon my theoretical evaluation of the historical and cultural modalities of textiles as theyrelate to future computational forms. -- Berzowska, 10,2Electronic Textiles: Wearable Computers, Reactive Fashion, and Soft Computation)

DIGITAL MEDIA MARKETING PLAN

COMMUNITY-DRIVEN INTERACTIVITY

• Create a Facebook Fan Page and allowusers to upload videos and photos

• Join Twitter. Engage with the audience byasking questions such as: What are you stuck on?”

INVESTMENT ADVERTISEMENT - IN THE LONG RUN

• Barter ads with etsy and instructables onone another’s site

• Use the incentive of CPA (cost per aquisition)with craft suppliers such as Simplicity and electronic part suppliers, such as Hobbypeople

• Run commercials in our how-to videos

• Feature products or brands for profit

HOW TO GET THE WORD OUT

• E-mail blast to design schools and craftgroups

• Join groups or forums to announce the launch via ning

• SEO Optimization to get to top hits on sites such as Digg, delicious and StumbleUpon

DIGITAL SERVICES

• Include a forum on blog for questionand answers

• provide an e-book via Issuu aftereach cycle is complete

• upload how-to videos on Vimeo

• create quizzes after each cyle to keepusers engaged

•create a Flickr account to store all imagesof craft-making or circuit building. Joingroups as well.