Summer of Extreme Design-Build

September 1 – November 30, 2021

Factor e Farm, Kansas City, USA

90 days of immersion hands-on builds where you collaborate with a team to build things that will blow you away. Here’s a chance to play with a lifesize Lego set, as we work to deliver the promise of open source hardware to real world change.
Happening as 3 main topic areas: construction, CNC machines, and heavy machines. Participate all of 3 months, 1 month, or select specific days. The schedule runs from 8 AM to 5 PM every day. For those who are staying all 3 months, we expect that you pace yourself – get good sleep every day and manage your energy level.
  • Sep 1 – Sep 29, 2021 – Seed Eco-Home 2, Aquaponic Greenhouse, 3D Printer, and Tractor. – We start with 14 days of the Seed Eco-Home 2 build, followed by 5 days of the Aquaponic Greenhouse, then 3 Days of 3D Printer workshop, and 7 days of the tractor build with Power Cubes + remote control for tractor. A diverse month of builds, 29 back-to-back days of events – see schedule below for final lineup.
  • October 1 – October 30, 2021 – CNC Machines Focus. – In the first 2 weeks, we start with the 1″ Universal Axis – to build a large 3D printer – about 1 meter bed by 2 meters tall – with heated chamber. We will build a filament maker and plastic shredder, so we can make 3D printing filament from, waste plastic. In the second half of October, we continue by adding a wide array of toolheads to the 1″ and 2″ Universal Axis, to make various CNC machines – CNC Torch Table, CNC Router, CNC Sawmill, CNC Grinder, Metal 3D Printer, CNC Lathe, and CNC Mill – using 1″ and 2″ Universal Axes. And – we’ll build a cluster 3D printer head (multiple print heads on one printer) for production printing. This month build primarily upon the Unviersal Axis, Universal Controller, and Universal Frames. See Schedule in next section for final lineup.
  • November 1 – November 30, 2021 – Heavy Machines and Construction. – The first 7 days, we will be developing products related to construction with the large 3D printer. Materials development includes creating formulas for materials such as plastic lumber, construction panels, glazing panels, wood composite plastic lumber, printing rubber tires, and printing domes with water-tight skins. We will aim to produce a 64 square foot, glazed aquaponic greenhouse module – for five dollars – the energy cost of printing with waste plastic and solar energy. With the metal printer (Wire-Arc Additive Manufacturing) – we will aim to develop functional 3D printed tractor parts. In the next 3 days, We will build 2 Brick Presses, developing Public Production Engineering for a CEB production enterprise. The next 3 days will focus on the Soil Conditioner – a soil/cement/water mixer device – that feeds the CEB press to make cement-stabilized blocks. The last 17 days will go all out on modular Universal Frame + Power Cube + Universal Rotor + Universal Track Unit + Universal Articulating Joint – to make a grand finale tractor and a number of implements: the tractor itself, additional Universal Track Units for scaling the drive, a backhoe, trencher, 360 degree pivot with remote control for applications such as the 360 degree backhoe – and hammermill, shredder, rubber airless wheels, pelletizer, brush cutter, finish mower, posthole auger, cherrypicker (elevating work platform), heavy duty dump trailer, pile driver, cement mixer, swing-blade sawmill, metal roller, bulldozer, and 20kW Verical Axis windmill. You can help to develop the Tractor Construction Set. See specific schedule in next section.

Build Yourself. Build Your World.

Did you ever want to design or build something – but did not know where to start? To address the need for practical skills and agency in today’s largely digital world – we created a summer program where you will learn more hands-on skills – across more diverse areas – than you would in a lifetime. You will learn to build 3D printers, CNC machines, tractors, houses, aquaponic systems – and much more. By leveraging open source design, group collaboration and swarm builds – and by building on open source part libraries – you will learn and absorb an experience that will shatter any limitations you may have regarding what is possible to build. You just may get more diverse, hands-on, design-build skills over this summer than you will in your lifetime, as you shift towards full agency in creating the world around you…

We focus on collaboration and 100% open source toolchains – allowing you to build viable products collectively in a small fraction of the time it would take to do on your own with YouTube videos as your only support. You have a chance to be an essential part of a public product development process to change the world.

It’s like a crash course for open hardware,You WILL learn, you WILL build relationships and friendships, you WILL have fun, and you WILL be blown away by what you’re capable doing – leveraging the collection creation of genius.

We welcome young women and men of any age to dive right in – to push the limits of rapid learning – to explore the limits of what we all can do together- with open hardware technology – through open collaboration.

This is our largest and most ambitious summer camp and build session to date. Building upon a decade of experience, hundreds of builds, and several product releases – we invite you to roll up your sleeves and contribute to the development of real technology that matters. For us – we’re interested in creating a rapid learning, practical experience – as practical skills are sorely missing in today’s digital world. So we decided to do something about it by offering a kind of experience that we only wished we got in college.

Join us for a fun experience that will shake your world, expand your mind, and reframe your definition of what’s possible. Upgrade your software (in your head), get out your open source tool kit for collaboration, and change the world! Enrollment is limited so please register now.

How It Works

Summer of Extreme Design-Build is a unique experience.. It is like a college campus / summer camp / Burning Man / startup camp meets open hardware for solving pressing world issues. Here are the pieces:
 

  1. Main Program is a total of 3 Months of on-site Immersive Learning and Hands-on builds. You can participate from as little as one day – and up to the full 3 months. While we would like everyone to spend 3 months on site – there is a wide range of partcipation options depending on one’s availability and interest level. Overall – the 3 months can convert an avid student from completely unskilled in builds – to one with a high level of proficiency – such as building 3D printers, houses, or tractors. 3 months of participation means opening up to the possibility of learning a significant portion of what we have developed over one decade of build experiments – and learning that in 3 months – which we think is priceless. We have options to sign up by the month – or by the day – see the schedule in the next section. If one has only a single day – we recommend joining us on the day we build the 3D printer, which participants take home with them. If one has 3-5 or so days, there will be a number of focused builds like this throughout the 3 months. We have an integrated approach of theory, principles, applied psychology, design, and build. This is the most unique opportunity in that nobody else in the world offers anywhere near the breadth and depth of design/build/innovation experience, in such a short time – across so many areas of technology and society. If you ever wanted to become an extreme builder – like I decided long ago – I can assure you that is within your reach – if you see a deep purpose in it. We are serious about delivering the potential of industrial productivity on a small scale – and have achieved breakthroughs in build speed and effectiveness through collaborative design, module-based design, a construction set approach, and swarm builds. We are offering a chance to average individuals – to get involved in cutting edge innovation, citizen science and engineering – certainly powerful material for many startups. We see clear potential for the distributed, open source economy – a breakthrough in societal mindset towards open/collaborative – and the profound implications this can have on regenerating the world. There was once a dream that was Open Source Hardware. It shall be realized.
  2. Daily Schedule, Workflow, and Purpose. We run the program from 8 AM to 5 PM each day, with an hour break for lunch at noon. There is plenty of time to socialize in the evening. We encourage people who are staying for an extended time to get a good night’s rest, as the program goes continuously back-to-back. For participants in the Enterprise Track – it goes 5 days per week from at 5:30 PM after the day ends. The core of the program is meaningful involvement of the public in sophisticated design tasks which revolve around breaking complex problems into bitesize chunks. The morning session, plus OSE Design Guides, provides guidance on how to design things from first principles. But we are not designing from nothing – we are building on modules that are already developed to some point – and all of us contribute to further development. This allows novices to learn design techniques rapidly – and reinforce their learning by practicing the art of building with these modules. That means that novices can make meaningful contributions to a complex development process. We work like a surgical team, with people taking on different roles. Most importantly, we believe in the collaborative creation of genious – ie, multiple brains working together being more effective than the sum of their individual parts. And we believe in leadership being the ability to teach others to rise to a higher level. There is no such thing as menial tasks – as innovation is 99% perspiration and 1% inspiration: most of the work to be done inolves a long process of due diligence. And this is where we work as teams and build upon others’ work – to minimize such burden. This is all to say: everyone who wants to can and should contribute meaningfully to innovative work – this is how we will make a better world.
  3. Seed Eco-Home Builder Crash Course. The first 14 days is a complete build of the Seed Eco-Home 2, using our modular build approach. This includes foundation, structure, and utilities, including the off-grid PV option. This empowers anyone interested in building our 1000 square foot Rosebud model – the skills to do so – even if they start with absolutely zero skills. We designed a system that is transparent, easy, expandable (incremental housing realized) and rapid to build – with a full digital model from which all documentation can be extracted. This means that anyone can now build a home like any builder could – but at significantly lower cost – the lowest cost possible. You will gain both design training and hands-on practice – see the Builder Crash Course Curriculum Overview.
  4. Enterprise Track. Because the Seed Eco-Home lends itself to rapid, swarm builds – that fuels a significant enterprise opportunity for entrepreneurial individuals. In fact, we have started an OSE Apprenticeship that allows people to work with OSE full time – building Seed Eco-Homes as the revenue model. To help more people build Seed Eco-Homes – in an enterprise capacity – we are providing enterprise training with all the necessary insights of the economics and ergonomics of production, and the resulting value proposition that allows one to work within a lean and viable revenue model. We go over build times, budgets, managing crews, negotiating with officials, sales and marketing, and more. The focus is on developing a scalable, open source franchise that can be replicated widely around the world, with light frame construction initially and expanding to Compressed Earth Block structures and 3D printed materials in 2022. The Enterprise Track is like night school – when the program ends at 5 PM daily for everyone else – people in the enterprise track continue with an evening session at 5:30 PM, seminar style. See details and learning plan at the Seed Eco-Home 2 Enterprise Track. Enterprise Track participants have the option to take additional time in practicing Seed Eco-Home 2 build techniques during the Summer X – as there will also be a dedicated House Builder Track running during Summer X – which will be posted in another announcement.
  5. Remote participation. We have recently installed a 1 gigabit internet pipe, and are wired for up to 4 gigabit service.
  6. We are taking this as an opportunity to take our remote offerings to the next level. First, we plan to expand internet coverage through all of our 30 acre facility. Second, we will set up dedicated video stations for reporting from the event at multiple classroom, workshop, and outdoor locations. We have built several solar power stations that will allow us to power up wireless video devices in remote locations of our campus. This way, all of our lectures and build activity will be live streamed or otherwise captured as video and timelapse, with a dedicated collaboration faciliator maintaining connections and facilitating teamwork with remote audiences. Each day consists of lecture, where remote participants can ask questions almost like they were on site. Each day includes 2 hours of design time, during which we collaborate on real design with remote participants – teaching Design Guide style skills that teach how to use existing work to build things with it – and how to modify our modules in continuing development. During the builds – remote participants will have a chance to view build activity from several views, and we will upload video footage nightly with timelapse summaries of each location, so that a remote participant can gain decent insights by reviewing daily footage and analyzing it in detail, as we will be capturing footage and timelapse in full HD and 4K resolution. Further, we will encourage participants to bring their own time lapse and action cameras, so that even more details can be captured – and will encourage daily uploads so they can be shared as a collaborative Google folder.

  7. Everyone builds their own 3D printer for Rapid Prototyping if they participate for one month or longer. If anyone is staying for 1 month or longer, we offer the D3D Universal 3D printer for an extra $500, which is a special price to Summer X participants only. A lot of the program involves design and prototyping – and with everybody having a printer – we can do so much more. Most students build their own 3D printer to take home with them – which is used extensively throughout the program. Everyone can be involved in testing our 3D printer filament blends. Combined with basic drafting literacy in FreeCAD, the permier open source CAD package – we use 3D printers for rapid, iterative prototyping as part of a development process. We can thus go from ideas to builds on the time scale of hours or even minutes, even for functional parts. We print with 1.2 mm nozzles, so we print strong parts 9x faster than standard hobby printers. We will use the 3D printer extensively to prototype working parts as well as scale models that help us understand what we build prior to building the full-size projects.
  8. Compression of Build Time Depends on Number of Participants.There are parts of the program where the results depend completely on the number of people that sign up. To give you a rough idea – we need a team of 12 people minimum to get week-scale build velocity on any build,including the Seed Eco-Home. We can say that each modular build takes 40 hours of experienced build time – but if we include learning time, it could be more like 160 hours – that is another doubling of time requirement. Thus, it would be 8 people working on 1 project per week. We can safely say that one week gets us one significant build with a team of 12 relative novices. So if you look at October with the 8 different CNC toolheads that make 8 different machines – we would expect half of this done if 24 people sign up – but we expect all of them to get done if 48 people sign up, which is our goal. The more people – the more visible and exciting the development velocity. We have learned how to avoid Brook’s Law with modular design, so that Summer X can be an exercise in effective, rapid development. It is our goal to learn how to increase the team size indefinitely – with the limit of the entire global population collaborating if needed.

Overview Schedule
Note: the Google Slides document below has 3 pages, scroll through it by clicking on the document or the arrows.

Intended Audience
  • People who want to learn practical build skills. If you have very little build skill but would like to increase your ability significantly, this program will provide the most breadth of experience in the shortest time possible. If you simply want to get exposed to what efficient swarm builds look like and feel like – to see if building your home or building other products is something that you will enjoy – this is a great opportunity if you just select a shorter portion of Summer X 2021.
  • So you want to build your own house? The 14 days starting on September 1 – the Builder Crash Course – provide you the complete experience of building your own house – at the lowest possible cost. We guarantee that you will pick up sufficient skill to be able to build all of the house modules up to at least a one story version of Rosebud, because we use simple design and pay complete attention to making the build easy with modular design, while eliminating difficult parts. If you thought that building your own home was completely beyond your skill set, we will help you shatter this myth. We are working hard to make a comprehensive, high quality, rapid learning experience – and we guarantee you that if you do not learn enough skills in the 2 weeks, you can repeat the course, for free – until you are completely comfortable building your home. See our Seed Home 2 – Rosebud Builder Guarantee.
  • Unjobbing. The Seed Eco-Home 2 is our most promising enterprise model that OSE has created to date. Everyone wants an affordable home, and we think that we are on the verge of opening up an open source revenue model of historical proportions. If you would like to consider becoming a builder, the 14 day Seed Eco-Home 2 (Rosebud model) build is a great start. We actaully have a 3 month program specifically to train builders to build Rosebud – happening at the same time as Summer X. This is like tech school – so if you are interested in this route – we are posting another annoucement about the ‘Tech School’ track for builders soon. We are innovating on technical education – in that we are looking for builders to learn not only technical skills, but the mindset of open collaboration and a growth mindset for lifelong learning.
  • Entrepreneurs. If you are entrepreneurial, and especially a social entrepreneur – and you’d like a career shift – then we recommend the Enterprise Track to you. The Enterprise Track is in addition to all the build training of Summer X – as learning the skills of Seed Eco-Home 2 construction is a good idea for anyone who will offer Seed Eco-Homes to others. If you already have construction skills, then taking our 14 day Builder Crash Course will be sufficient if you want to take the rest of the Enterprise Track remotely.
  • Inspiration. If you would like to develop a more optimistic viewpoint of the state of the world, we are likely to infect you with optimism that comes from one’s ability to build physical things – literally to build their world. If you want to change the world and are looking for direction or inspiration, you’ve come to the right place. Idealogical grounds can also include anyone interested in reinventing the economy through collaborative design and distributed production using open source toolchains. People who enjoy rapid learning of new things will feel at home with us.
    College students looking for applied, hands-on skills and learning to balance their curriculum will find a breath of fresh air. Teachers who want to expand their classroom to global collaborative design can get a lot of insight on practical ways to do this. Competitive students looking to pad their college applications will also enjoy a simultaneously exploration of a mind-opening experience. We certainly are optimistic about the possibility of change – which many ecologically-concerned individuals can find in our program – via inspiration from a creative and practical approach to address economic production and sustainability. Peak performance seekers may be interested in learning about the limits of personal manufacturing and public product development as new paradigms in a global shift. People who believe that cities should produce all that they need may be inspired, as we provide some solutions for getting there.
  • D3D Universal 3D Printer Kit

    As part of the Summer X, each participant who signs up for one month or longer in the program will receive a D3D Universal 3D Printer. For any of the shorter term options, the 3D printer is sold separately. Since we will be using the 3D printer as an essential tool in rapid prototyping in all parts of the program outside of the Builder Crash Course, we recommend that participants get the printer prior to Summer X and bring it with them if possible.

    Facilitators

    Marcin Jakubowski – Facilitator for the 3 Months

    Marcin was trained as a fusion physicist. He left academia right after finishing his Ph.D. to start a farm – in Missouri – and founded Open Source Ecology. For the last 10 years, he has been working on the Global Village Construction Set – now 1/3 complete – a set of enabling tools and machines for building regenerative infrastructures. Marcin is passionate about creating the Open Source Economy – a new operating system for Earth. Marcin will facilitate the classroom, design review, and Enterprise Track sessions, and will try to stay out of the workshop as he is trying to move up in management.
    See Marcin’s bio and Global Village Construction Set Ted Talk:

    Catarina Mota – Facilitator for Construction

    Catarina is an open source advocate. She founded the Open Building Institute, co-founded Open Materials (do-it-yourself smart materials) and AltLab (Lisbon’s hackerspace). Previously, she co-chaired the Open Hardware Summit 2012, served on the board of directors of the Open Source Hardware Association, taught as an adjunct faculty member at ITP-NYU, and was a fellow of the National Science and Technology Foundation of Portugal. Catarina holds a Ph.D. in communication sciences and her research work focuses on the social impact of open and collaborative practices for the development of technologies. She is a founding member the Open Source Hardware Association and a TED fellow.

    Jeff Higdon – Facilitator for Heavy Machines

    Generalist, entrepreneur, teacher, off gridder, and “Mr. Fixit Man”. Jeff came across Open Source Ecology while taking Geoff Lawton’s permaculture design course and was bitten by the bug. Frustrated with overly complicated proprietary technology and repair manuals that say “take to a qualified technician”, he immediately saw the value in open source. Jeff brings to the table a broad depth of knowledge from his background working in and managing manufacturing and repair centers over the years and teaching vocational skills in a prison. Both at work and in his spare time he can generally be found building or fixing something using welding, fabrication, and team play.

    Logistics

    We can pick up participants who are arriving by plane at the Kansas City International Airport the evening before the first day of each month. Otherwise, you will have to find your own transportation. Due to COVID, we recommend the COVID vaccine to participants, and we will take any precautions necessary to meet both the needs of both safety and of the freedom of choice regarding vaccination. Since we will be working in close quarters in a large group environment with close contact for many collaborative tasks – we are taking the responsibility to make sure that everyone is safe. We do not know how COVID will play out, so as we get closer to the event, we will report on updates regarding either tightening or loosening up restrictions. Note that we cannot predict what quarantine restrictions will be in place for September, so please plan to make arrangements as needed. We will have the capacity to quarantine people on site, and will provide personal protective equipment and safety protocols as needed.

    Accommodations

    We have 21 spots for participants who want to stay at the HabLab—our shared-room dorm, and 2 Solar Cubicles for a total of 23 people. There is no extra cost for staying at the dorm and spots are filled on a “first come, first served” basis. Please note that this is a very rudimentary earth building and our accommodations are rough. The dorm rooms may be noisy due to late night conversations by participants. We are building 12 or more summer cabins, so we will have added capacity to house people in small private cabins at a rate of $25 per night. If you are interested in this option, please inquire. Participants are also free to camp out in our designated camping area. RVs may be brought on site, and we plan to have 4 RV outlets at 30A 120V available. We are building both an outdoor kitchen and bathroom, with max capacity of serving 200 people. Factor e Farm is an experimental facility that is permanently under construction, so please gauge your expectations accordingly. If you want a more comfortable stay, we recommend that you stay in a hotel.
    Participants may secure a hotel in Cameron, Missouri (15 miles away) if there is no suitable space on site. Please note that there is no public transportation between Cameron and Factor e Farm and that we cannot pick you up or drop you off on a daily basis during the workshop. Car rentals are available at the KCI airport.
    We also have primitive camping on site which includes a composting toilet.

    Transportation

    The nearest airport is Kansas City International (MCI), about 1:15 hours away from Factor e Farm. FeF is located in a rural zone and there is no public transportation of any kind in the immediate area,though buses do arrive in St. Joseph, Cameron, and a train station is found in Kansas City.
    If you are driving, please schedule your arrival on site at 6 PM or later on the evening one day before the start date of the Summer X month of your interest. Please schedule your departure on the day after the Camp if you need a ride to the airport.

    We are scheduling airport pickup at 8 PM on the evening before the first day of the workshop each month. We are scheduling an airport dropoff in the morning after the last day of each Summer X month. Airport dropoff will be as early as needed for the first flight, so plan accordingly. Car rentals are available at the KCI airport, if you’d rather not wait for pick up or dropoff.

    Since the round trip to the airport is 2:30 hours, ideally we would like to make only one trip to the airport at the times above. The MCI airport is small and there isn’t much to do there, but it has a few restaurants/cafes and quiet areas to rest. We will also try to coordinate transportation if any people arriving by car are willing to pick others up from the airport.

    To the extent that it’s possible, we request that you try to schedule your flight arrival and departure as above to make logistics smoother.

    Meals

    OSE will provide breakfast, lunch, and dinner. We are not growing produce at this time, so we will go to the supermarket for supplies.

    If you need additional food, Cameron, Missouri, is 15 miles away and has a food store and a Walmart. There is also a small grocery store in Maysville, which is 2.5 miles away.

    What to Pack

    You are welcome to bring your own tools if you wish to. But we will have all the necessary tools on site—as well as work gloves, protective eyewear, and hard hats.

    Please bring steel-toe boots – as we may be working with heavy metal objects. Steel toed boots are the safest footwear for any workshop. Steel toed boots are required for safety in the workshop, and people without steel toed boots are not allowed in the workshop.

    This being Missouri, the weather is highly unpredictable. It is likely to be hot. It can also get quite muddy when it rains, so sturdy boots are recommended.

    Please also bring a sleeping bag and a bath towel if If you’re staying in the HabLab, we have fitted sheets, pillows and pillow cases available – but you may want to bring your own pillow if that’s something that is important to you. If you’re camping, please pack everything you’d normally pack for a camping trip.

    Registration

    Note: early bird deadline is 23:59, June 3, 2021. The following are back to back starting September 1, 2021. You have options to register for individual workshops, or you can sign up for the whole month for up to 20% off the individual prices. Or you can sign up for the entire 3 months of immersion to learn more diverse areas than you would in a lifetime. We offer a remote option, and an Enterprise Track for individuals interested in starting an enterprise around the Seed Eco-Home. True Fans get a 20% discounts, and we can offer work exchange prior to workshop start for reduced cost admission. The full list of possibilities is:

    Registration Options
    • Early Bird Registration  – Main Program – 1 month: $3495 for one month. 1 month of onsite participation includes tuition, room, board, and also the D3D Universal 3D Printer. If you’d like to participate in more than one month, each additional month is $3495. Deadline for early bird registration is Monday, May 31, 2021 at 11:59 PM, after which the cost goes to $3695. See How it Works for more about this track.
    • Builder Crash Course We havea an early bird price of $2100 for the 14 day Builder Crash Course, after which it goes up to $2450. See schedule for the program. Includes room and board as discussed at Logistics
    • Early Bird Registration – Enterprise Track: The enterprise track is offered only as the full, 3 month option – on top of the main program – at a cost of $2995 (on top of the . We offer a remote option at the same cost of $2995 if you are already a builder and would like to collaborate on enterprise development – but in this case you would also need to take at least the 14 day Builder Crash Course part of Summer X in order to get the necessary practical skills that will help you on the enterprise part. Please inquire for more info. See How it Works for more about this track.
    • Remote Participation – Remote participation costs $499 for one month of remote participation. This does NOT include the Enterprise Track, which is reserved for on-site participants only, or as a special case for See How it Works for more about this track. The OSE Dev Kit is not included in the Remote Participation option, but you can purchase that separately at our products dropdown menu.
    • Individual Days You are welcome to participate for any duration at $175/day of onsite activity. See details of schedule to select your days. Includes room and board as discussed at Logistics.
    • Donate to OSESponsor another participant or Donate to OSE: We are a nonprofit organization with 501(c)3 status, and you can make tax-deductible contributions to us. You can fund attendance of someone who is on the waiting list for financial assistance. We receive low-income assistance requests for all of our workshops. Sponsor by paying the quantity on the order form below. Please email us at info@opensourceecology.org that you are sponsoring someone else. We can send you a tax deduction receipt (US customers only). You can also donate via BitCoin:

    Bitcoin Address: ”’166yC48RakrZdtsBj36vY9q29CpzknHbxY”’

    Payment Options: PayPal, Check, eCheck Bitcoin, Money Order, or Wire Transfer

    To register, we use Eventzilla (below) – which accepts PayPal or eCheck options. Using the eCheck option (bank routing + account number) avoids the 3% PayPal fee. To avoid fees, you can send payment (paper check, etc.) to Open Source Ecology, 909 SW Willow Rd, Maysville, MO 64469. We can also accept Bitcoin and wire transfers. Email us at info at opensourceecology.org for additional instructions.

    All sales are final, as we are making significant material purchases and incurring logistics expenses in preparation for this camp. In case of the unlikely events such as weather, disease, or civil unrest, we plan to postpone the event until a more favorable date. If a schedule conflict arises for you, you are welcome to come to our next event. We run workshops on a regular basis. Your tickets may be exchangeable for another event of equal value in the future, or you can transfer the your tickets for someone else to take your place.


    Contact

    Have questions? Drop us an email: info-at-opensourceecology-dot-org


    FAQ

    What are the realistic expectations for me making a living building Seed Eco-Homes as a result of Summer X? If you already have enterprise savvy, what we teach you in the Enterprise Track will enable you to run crews that build Seed Eco-Homes by leaning all of the insights that make our operation successful. This means we will teach you about the workflows, ergonomics, cost stucture, the technology itself, and we are open to collaborate with you in ways such as providing leads. For new entrepreneurs – the expectation may be that it will take you more than a year to become profitable as an entrepreneur. This is under the assumption that you are the entrepreneur managing others – and not building yourself. However, if you learn to be a builder (for example via a 3 month Builder Track that runs at the same time as the Summer X – then we have a hard time imagining that you would not be able to find customers for the home, which would guarantee an absolute minimum of $25/hour as the low end of a builder-entrepreneur position in the USA.

    Can I start a business with one of your machines? Absolutely – they are open source and we do not hide any trade secrets. We do have years of prior art that you can build upon – so productization of your own can be highly likely. However, this is different than the question ‘will I succeed.’ If you are already an entreprenuer, you will very likely succeed, as you know that there are pitfalls and have the problem-solving ability to solve them – just like we have. If you are new to enterprise – there are no guarantees outside of if you have perseverance, you will succeed. As a general rule – all businesses succeed – if the operator persists at it for enough time – but in practice – most new businesses fail because the operator does not persist, runs out of money, time, etc. The golden rule is the obvious statement that more money has to come in than leave a business. Philosophically speaking – if you understand what that means at a deep level, then you are likely to succeed. If you think this obvious statement is really obvious, then you probably do not understand enough about business. For example, even huge opearations such as Uber don’t understand this profound statement, as they are not yet profitable as of this writing.

    Summer of Extreme Design-Build? Isn’t this more like the Fall of Extreme Design-Build? Right, we’ll be at the end of summer, and mostly in the Fall. The name was retained from our usual summer schedule – which did not happen last year due to Covid. We have postponed to a later date this year to address the issue of immunity to Covid.

    What are the logistics of returning home with the 3D printer kit, as I assume these are large machines. Right, the D3D Universal can be shipped in the USA for $22 at the USPO using a large flat rate box. You can also pack it in your luggage – it can fit in a backpack. However, you may need to put it in your checked in baggage, as some parts will be questioned at security.

    Does the Remote Participation include the Dev Kit? No, but you can email us to pre-order one or order from our Products dropdown.

    Can the videos be watched again after the live stream? Yes, we are recording all the classroom live streams, and we will send a YouTube link to all participants. We will also be doing a number of time lapses and build videos, and all these assets will likewise be available to participants. We are investing significantly in video production infrastructure to cover all of our site and produce full HD feeds and some 4K timelapse assets.

    We live in Europe, and are very worried about the possibility that COVID will make travel impossible. Can you please lay out the alternatives in the event that the pandemic makes it impossible for us attend? In case someone cannot attend the SummerX program for emergency reasons, such as the pandemic, family or work reasons, etc – they are welcome to attend the next event. There is a chance that the pandemic flares up, we may need to change our schedule – but so far it looks good. We are running the Summer of Extreme Design-Build annually, and expanding the program, so if one misses the opportunity, they are welcome to attend the next session for an equivalent amount of time. If the cost structure changes, they are still welcome to attend for the same amount of time as their initial registration. Another alternative is to transfer the registration to someone else in their place.

    If I have two single months paid for for two individuals, can I combine them for two months for one individual? Yes, just let us know ahead of time so we can address logistics issues if needed.

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