China has a problem with tax evasion. Stores often keep at least two sets of books (and sometimes three). There’s the actual books, and there’s the government books. When people go to a store and purchase something, the purchase may …
If you are coming to China to manufacture, it’s is essential to have your ducks in a row and anticipate common problems. It’s probably not enough to have a handmade prototype. You need a completely designed PCB, a complete BOM, …
This is a normal thing to see in the mornings. Little kids all line up before school in rows and columns and do exercises led by their teachers. They’re as coordinated as little kids can be, and the parents and …
This is a dried rose. It tastes like dried stawberries. It’s very sweet, and the petals are small and make it have a different texture from strawberry. Apparently all that is done is some sugar or honey is added for …
Sunday, April 8 was the Shenzhen Mini Maker Faire, put on by Seeedstudio. There was a good group of projects, though the robots category dominated the list, with little, and not so little, mechanical things running around the floor and …
It’s been suggested to me that I should avoid injection molded plastics wherever possible, and try to go with thermoformed plastic. Generally I research and validate advice before following it, so I started researching when thermoforming should be used over …
If you’ve ever seen the Korean movie “Castaway on the Moon”, you’ll remember that noodles and black bean sauce play an important role in the movie. It’s a really good movie, by the way. So when I saw it in …
Star Prototype is a prototyping facility for doing short runs of products (in the tens) to develop the tool and verify the design and make iterations on the prototype before going to mass production. After working with Star, one is …
Over the past month the biggest lesson I’ve learned is that hardware isn’t called that because it’s physical; it’s called that because it’s really difficult to do. In talking to people who have had successful and unsuccessful products, they are …
These are steamed buns, and they are an extremely common breakfast food. There are about two venders on every block in the street or small booths each morning. You can choose between plain, meat, bean, vegetable, some kind of veggie …