ZDay 2013 Holland

Been a week now since I visited ZDay 2013 here in the Netherlands. The guys over here from the Zeitgeist Movement had made a schedule over 2 days! Quite remarkable. So they had speakers on saturday and sunday as well as workshops. Saturday was quickly sold out, due in no small part of speaker Willem Middelkoop who is a frequent guest on television and isn't shy about criticizing the current economic system.

I visited on sunday and the location is quite lovely. Have been there before during the 'Witte de With festival' in september last year. Hope the Zeitgeist guys in Rotterdam can use that location more often. Anyway, first I listened to a lecture by Robert Schram who's a Zeitgeist member and talked about our current socio-economic system. That lasted for about an hour. Then I visited a workshop 3D Printing led by Thijs.

In case you're wondering, 3D printing is the way of the future. The machine that you can buy these days uses plastic (at the moment) to make objects. I've seen videos that some people used the machine to make gun parts! If other material can be inserted like a type of metal, carbon fibre or crystals of some sort than it becomes even more revolutionary. Limits in construction would be pushed further. This technology holds tremendous potential.

Fantastic work by all the Zeitgeist members involved! We are moving forward...

3D It

The future of cars is making itself available, 3D printing. The article can be found here. It's a technology that has been around but just right now is increasingly expanding into mainstream. The body of the car which can be made from plastics is simply printed out layer by layer on a machine. This will undoubtedly cut back on production time and in the longer run cut down on costs. Build in lithium-ion batteries within the chassis is another fairly new technology. Combine the two and I'm fairly confident we are looking at a quick and easy way of building a car. If it will be affordable is another question.