(Flash embed above, downloadable MP4 link here.)

Continuing in our retrospective of favorite Boing Boing tv episodes, we revisit the fun we had checking out TechShop, an open-access public workshop that's kind of like a health club with heavy machinery and sparks instead of treadmills. Tinkerers, inventors, and hackers pay a membership fee, and in turn receive access to professionally-maintained gear, workshops, mentors, and a community of like-minded makers.

Currently there is only one site in Silicon Valley, and it opened in 2006. But founder Jim Newton (a lifetime maker, veteran BattleBots builder and former MythBuster) plans to open a number of locations around the US -- and eventually, the rest of the world.

John Todd, who you'll meet in this episode, wrote this article about the membership-based machine and fabrication shop in a recent edition of Kevin Kelly's Cool Tools zine. Snip:

I've been a member since before TechShop really even started, back when it was just some guys passing out flyers trying to gauge interest. For $100 a month, members can use any tool in the shop on which they've received training. MUCH cheaper than buying your own gear. The list of equipment is pretty extensive, too, and new items are arriving frequently (like a new hot-wire foam cutter).

John shares an additional note with BBtv about the company's business model:

TechShop is unusual in the way it's funded - community members are the financial backers. To date, TechShop has been funded by taking loans from members and repaying them at a nominal rate. Typically backers contribute $25k and up, and are then paid back over several years. There is an "A" round being raised now to fund the nationwide expansion, and the first funding source again is going to be the community instead of focusing on traditional VC sources. It's an unusual way to keep members excited about what they do at TechShop, and to keep them focused on making the whole experience better. Jim Newton (CEO) and Mark Hatch (COO) are looking for additional interested people who want to become members and funders - contact TechShop for details.

In part two of this episode, we take a joyride in a three-wheeled electric car.

Update: Complete and unedited transcript of our interview here.

In today's episode of Boing Boing tv: One year ago, a 19-year-old MIT engineering student named Star Simpson got dressed to go pick up a friend at Boston's Logan airport. She pulled a hoodie out of her closet, a wearable tech design she'd made with a light-up LED-circuit on the chest. In her hand was a small pink rose she'd crafted from hardened clay, a gift for her friend.

A few hours later at the airport, after an airport employee mistook her sweatshirt for a bomb and the rose for an explosive implement, Star found herself surrounded by 40 armed police who believed she was a suicide bomber. She was arrested for "possessing a hoax device," and an unprecedented media frenzy ensued. Here was the Boing Boing post from that day.

A year later, after a long series of court dates, a Boston judge ruled that Star must perform community service and make a public apology. Star says she intended no harm. She believes the authorities were unfairly harsh with her long after it was obvious she posed no threat, and that legal proceedings were unduly influenced by a prevailing atmosphere of anxiety over terrorism (this just months after a similar case in Boston).

She has since dropped out of MIT, and says the school's reaction felt like "being disowned." She moved out of Boston in part because of recurring threats and attacks from strangers.

Star has finally come forward to tell her side of the story publicly, and she does so on Boing Boing tv today.

If you'd like to make your very own LED breadboard hoodie, the folks at Instructables have just published Star's plans here. They're too graceful to say this, but I will: do not wear this to airports. Make a Breadboard Sweatshirt (Instant Wearable Electronics!)

MAKE will soon be publishing a related article.

Previous Boing Boing tv episodes :
* Star Simpson's fuzzy logic, MacGyver, MIT lasers, and trippy glasses: Maker Faire with Phil Torrone

Related Boing Boing blog posts:
* MIT student arrested for entering Boston airport with "fake bomb"
* Improvising electronic devices is not a crime
* OK Go's LED Jackets
* ATHF LEDs all over Boston today

Boing Boing tv is taking a week off for organic yak-yogurt wrestling on a private Himalayan island; we leave you to enjoy some of our crew's favorite past episodes in the meantime.

"Gem sweater diva" and midwestern maven Leslie Hall has appeared twice on our show. The video featured above is a tour diary she recorded just for us. If you like that, check out our backstage visit with her during a stop in San Francisco, below. "With these shoulder pads, I have the strength to destroy villages, homes and crops."

Original BBtv posts:
* Leslie Hall: Dear Diary
* Leslie Hall: ceWEBrity, gem sweater diva, jammer of jams.

The Boing Boing tv crew is taking this end-of-summer week off from production, so we're revisiting some of our favorite episodes from the last couple of months -- fun stuff you may have missed.

Today: John Behrens and "Omega Recoil" build giant Tesla Coils. Their work explores how electronic fields can be excited in the environment, and their creations become the centerpieces of interactive public art performances.

Some of the tinkerers and performers in this SF Bay Area-based collective were previously associated with Dr. Megavolt, an electrical art project which...

[featured] a person in a metal mesh suit interacting with artificially generated lighting. The Doctor sets objects on fire with electricity originating from large Tesla coils, spars with the electric arcs and exhorts the audience to worship the elemental force of electricity.

Last week, eight American citizens were detained in Beijing for participating in pro-Tibetan sovereignty protests near the site of the 2008 Olympics, with Students for a Free Tibet. Two videobloggers who documented those protest and guerrilla art installations evaded detention, and spoke to Boing Boing TV on Friday Beijing time about why they were there, what they witnessed, and why it mattered.

Jay Dedman and Ryanne Hodson of Ryanishungry.com spoke to us over Skype from a hostel in Beijing. One of the actions they documented in photo and video was the hanging of an "LED throwies" light banner, below, which read "FREE TIBET." We agreed to hold this Boing Boing tv episode until after we received word that they'd safely left the country. They have returned home, so I am posting the piece today.

Correction: Yesterday, we posted news that 6 Americans who'd been detained were now released and on their way to Los Angeles. Turns out that in fact, a total of 8 were detained -- the last two, from a later protest, a photograph of which is posted below (Thanks, NF and Students for a Free Tibet).

Previously on Boing Boing blog:
* UPDATE: US citizens detained in Beijing over Tibet protests are released, returning home.
* Beijing and Tibet: GRL's James Powderly, Brian of "Alive in Baghdad, 4 other US citizens receive 10-day jail sentence
* Beijing update: New detentions, 6 US protesters missing, Tibetan protesters in Tibet reportedly shot dead.
* Beijing: "Alive in Baghdad" videoblogger among US citizens detained in pro-Tibet protests
* Beijing: Five US activists detained after lighting up "Free Tibet" LED Throwies banner near Olympics site
* GRL's James Powderly detained in Beijing for planning pro-Tibet "L.A.S.E.R. Stencil" art protest

Related episodes of Boing Boing tv:
* BBtv WORLD (Tibet): Inside Lhasa
* Vlog (Xeni): Tibet report - monks forced to participate in staged videos.
* Vlog (Xeni): Tibet's uprising and the internet

BBtv guest teen haxxor correspondent 5t311a teaches us how to do guerilla t-shirt silkscreening, as described in Cory Doctorow's novel Little Brother, and as detailed in a recent series of Instructables posts. (Thanks, Charis Tobias!)

Today on Boing Boing tv, Xeni and Pesco dive deeper into the magical chocolate factory founded by a NASA software developer.

In this installment of BBtv's 3-part series on TCHO Chocolate, we learn more about the hacked-together, home-tinkered machines and high-tech wizardry that keep the factory running. The philosophy is "scrappy, not crappy," as founder Timothy Childs explains.

TCHO's R&D lab contains such diverse components as Space Shuttle tape, a modded RONCO turkey oven, stone grinders used in Indian restaurants, and deconstructed space heater parts from the local hardware store.

Next, we zoom in to the molecular-level science behind this most delicious confection. Science buffs, rejoice! This episode is as fun for your eyes and brain as the "obsessively good" chocolate is for your mouth -- Polymorph fun for the whole family. Warning: this episode is NSFC (not safe for chocoholics).

Previously on Boing Boing tv:
* TCHO, part 1: chocolate origins.

Related: read a feature about TCHO by David Pescovitz in the current issue of MAKE Magazine, Timothy and the Chocolate Factory.

Here are some iPhone snapshots from Xeni on Flickr: TCHO, Boing Boing tv.

(Special thanks to Amy Critchett, and Wayne & Breanna)

Today on Boing Boing tv -- a sneak preview of Heavy Load: A Film About Happiness, a new documentary about a UK punk band whose members include people who have developmental disabilities.

'70s punk star Wreckless Eric describes them as "a triumph of dysfunctionalness," and even Kylie Minogue (they've covered a hit song of hers) has become a fan.

The band says their mission is...

...to demonstrate that disability rocks. There are few genres left in music that have yet to be defined. Heavy Load have unwittingly created a brand new one.

The band is also behind a campaign called "Stay Up Late" which advocates for the right of cognitively disabled people to be allowed to go out, supervised, to live music shows and -- well, stay out late enough to actually see and hear the show. Again, from the band:

We play gigs all over the country and we have noticed that something strange happens at 9.00pm – people start to go home. Heavy Load are fed up with people with learning disabilities leaving club nights and gigs early because their staff finish their shifts at 10pm. This means they are missing out.

If this happens to you: You need to talk about this with your friends, support workers, family and advocates. Our ‘Stay Up Late’ campaign is to make managers and staff know that we want them to plan ahead and talk to us about what we want to do...

The full-length documentary premieres on the US cable network IFC on June 23rd, 9PM ET/10PM PT, and again on 24th June. (Special thanks to BB's Mark Frauenfelder, and to the film's director, Jerry Rothwell)

More gems from Bay Area Maker Faire 2008: Boing Boing co-editor David Pescovitz speaks with Kaden Harris, author of Eccentric Cubicle, and the brains behind Eccentricgenius.ca -- eccentric antiques from a parallel universe. He shows us his Silicon Projectile Centrifuge (a lovely lethal weapon that shoots marbles at high velocity), a combination lamp/bong, and other exotica from the halls of beautiful Eccentric Manors.

Then, Xeni is zapped by Jack Sparx, who uses his body as an electrical transformer, zapping all who come near with low-level shocks in the name of science. As Xeni demonstrates, the jolts from his mini-Tesla Coils are not *that* low-level, either.

Bonus: ironic t-shirt catwalk; Xeni and the BBtv crew stopped Maker Faire attendees in their tracks, and asked them to explain their hipster t-shirts.

Previous Boing Boing tv episodes from Maker Faire:

Star Simpson's fuzzy logic, MacGyver, MIT lasers, and trippy glasses: Maker Faire with Phil Torrone

Combat robots, warring battleships: Xeni at Maker Faire

(special thanks to Scott Beale, Eddie Codel, and Waneco Leisure Industries)

Today on Boing Boing tv, Cory Doctorow invites you to create and share HOWTO videos based on an ongoing series of Instructables posts that draw from his latest book, Little Brother.

Here's how Andrew “bunnie” Huang, author of Hacking the Xbox, describes the book:

[A] scarily realistic adventure about how homeland security technology could be abused to wrongfully imprison innocent Americans. A teenage hacker-turned-hero pits himself against the government to fight for his basic freedoms. This book is action-packed with tales of courage, technology, and demonstrations of digital disobedience as the technophile’s civil protest.

Here's how to submit your Little Brother HOWTO video to Boing Boing tv:

(1) Shoot it!
(2) Upload it to YouTube or another video hosting site!
(3) Tell us where to find it! Submit the url here.
(4) Selected videos will be featured on BBtv!

Also in today's episode (which, by the way, is Cory's BBtv debut): Legendary dumpster-diver Darren Atkinson was the subject of Cory's first-ever WIRED magazine feature in 1994. Cory returns to the trash-heap for BBtv with the "modern industrialist philosopher of garbage," who also performs in multiple WHO cover bands.

In related news, here's a Little Brother library/school donation project update, and if you're in Chicago, come on out to one of the Little Brother events taking place in your area over the next two days!

Boing Boing tv's embedded robo-combat reporter Xeni Jardin witnesses warfare inside Robogames and Combots at Bay Area Maker Faire 2008, where robots battle until death -- or at least 'til one competitor busts a sprocket.

Next, BB-gun wielding battleships go BOOM!, with the Western Warship Combat Club. Participants painstakingly re-create historic battleships on small scale, and outfit each warboat with actual artillery. He who sinks last wins. The cameraman took a pellet or two in the pants, but the goofy safety goggles kept all eyes intact.

If you dig the robots, you may enjoy the upcoming Robogames. The world's largest robot show takes place Fri, June 13th through Sun, June 15 in San Francisco. Link to tickets.

Make Magazine senior editor Phil Torrone guides us through the wonders of Maker Faire 2008 in San Mateo.

First, we learn about "fuzzy logic," soft electronic circuit components, with Star Simpson -- the 20 year old MIT student arrested for a "fake bomb" at Boston's Logan Airport in 2007 when authorities mistook her interactive LED t-shirt for a terrorist device. Her trial is scheduled for May 23, by the way, so she wasn't able to answer our questions about that ordeal just yet.

Next up, also from MIT -- Ed Baafi introduces us to the fabulous "fab lab," where complex fabrication technologies are made easy.

Then, Phil shows us affordable laser etching to personalize your iPhone or laptop.

Inventor and hacker Mitch Altman demonstrates the "brain machine," a device that stimulates your mind's eye. Mitch also invented TV-B-Gone, a sort of secret kill switch for kills television sets ("the only TV remote you need!").

And Lee Zlotoff, the creator of TV's MacGyver reveals plans for a MacGyver film project.

Today on Boing Boing tv, Xeni visits TechShop, an open-access public workshop that's kind of like a health club with heavy machinery and sparks instead of treadmills. Tinkerers, inventors, and hackers pay a membership fee, and in turn receive access to professionally-maintained gear, workshops, mentors, and a community of like-minded makers.

Currently there is only one site in Silicon Valley, and it opened in 2006. But founder Jim Newton (a lifetime maker, veteran BattleBots builder and former MythBuster) plans to open a number of locations around the US -- and eventually, the rest of the world.

John Todd, who you'll meet in this episode, wrote this article about the membership-based machine and fabrication shop in a recent edition of Kevin Kelly's Cool Tools zine. Snip:

I've been a member since before TechShop really even started, back when it was just some guys passing out flyers trying to gauge interest. For $100 a month, members can use any tool in the shop on which they've received training. MUCH cheaper than buying your own gear. The list of equipment is pretty extensive, too, and new items are arriving frequently (like a new hot-wire foam cutter).

John shares an additional note with BBtv about the company's business model:

TechShop is unusual in the way it's funded - community members are the financial backers. To date, TechShop has been funded by taking loans from members and repaying them at a nominal rate. Typically backers contribute $25k and up, and are then paid back over several years. There is an "A" round being raised now to fund the nationwide expansion, and the first funding source again is going to be the community instead of focusing on traditional VC sources. It's an unusual way to keep members excited about what they do at TechShop, and to keep them focused on making the whole experience better. Jim Newton (CEO) and Mark Hatch (COO) are looking for additional interested people who want to become members and funders - contact TechShop for details.

In part two of today's episode, we take a joyride in a three-wheeled electric car.

Avatar Machine, by designer Marc Owens, is a wearable device that simulates the experience of third-person gaming environments.

By wearing this costume and head-mounted camera with VR goggles, a user can view themselves as a sort of virtual character while moving around and interacting in the real world.

Owens created Avatar Machine to explore whether such a device would grant users "a diminished sense of social responsibility (...) and demonstrate behaviors normally reserved for the gaming environment." In other words, turn them into instant board trolls.

Owens, 26, is a design student at the Royal College of Art, and lives in East London. An earlier version of this experiment from Owens circulated around the web in 2007.

In part one of today's Boing Boing tv episode, we premiere an all-new experiment with Avatar Machine -- live beta testing conducted in 2008, in the Harajuku area of Tokyo. Here, the user (Owens) flirts with Harajuku hotties, then almost gets his ass kicked (for real!) by some Japanese gangster dudes.

In part two of today's show, Xeni speaks with Owens over a Skype video connection, live from his studio in East London.

HowStuffWorks has a step-by-step explanation of the device here. (special thanks to Susannah Breslin)

Boing Boing tv presents CUPCAKE CUTTHROATS, a cakesploitation epic exploring the dark side of electric art-cars shaped like baked goods. These homemade vehicles are crafted by Silicon Valley nerds (including one engineer from Tesla Motors) and Burning Man enthusiasts in a Berkeley, California, warehouse. In today's episode, Xeni joins the marauding muffineers for a 15-mph thrillride down mean, sugar-sprinkled streets.

CBS News almost blew our cover! The muffineers say, "We dedicate our efforts in memory of Keith Taft." A full list of cupcake art car bakers designers and drivers, after the jump.

Today on Boing Boing tv, a vlog from Mark about Socialbomb, a real-world tech game that explores social circles and ways to measure interpersonal reputation.

The current version is designed to accommodate 30 players. Each player is awarded points for being near players with higher reputations, and penalized for being near players with lower reputations. Bonuses and penalties are applied according to overall social promiscuity and status. The player with the worst reputation score is the 'Socialbomb.' Their score will have the most negative impact on a social circle.

Shot on location at the O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference.

A number of credit card companies now issue credit cards with embedded RFIDs (radio frequency ID tags), with promises of enhanced security and speedy transactions.

But on today's episode of Boing Boing tv, hacker and inventor Pablos Holman shows Xeni how you can use about $8 worth of gear bought on eBay to read personal data from those credit cards -- cardholder name, credit card number, and whatever else your bank embeds in this manner.

Fears over data leaks from RFID-enabled cards aren't new, and some argue they're overblown -- but this demo shows just how cheap and easy the "sniffing" can be.

This episode is part of our ongoing series of interviews with some of the thinkers, hackers, and tinkerers at the O'Reilly Emerging Technology conference this year.

Xeni speaks with author and Wired editor in chief Chris Anderson, and "airplane geek" Jordi Munoz, about the quest to create the ultimate sub-$100 aerial drone. One design involved the use of a Nintendo Wii controller. UAVs are often associated with military combat or police surveillance, but what "friendlier" uses might we put them to, in civilian hands? Shot at the O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference in San Diego, California. Here's more on their Minimum Blimp.

Mark visits student inventors in Illinois, and learns about electronic firefly jars, recycled cassette tape holders, and a solar powered lamp for the developing world.

Today on Boing Boing tv: a vlog from Mark about "Peggy," a fun little light emitting pegboard kit. Mark says:

Remember those LED signs from the great Boston Mooninite debacle of 2007, in which a street promo campaign for a television show turned into a big security scare? They are in fact fun to make, and not at all deadly -- I spoke with Windell from Evil Mad Science, which sells kits so you can make pegboard signs at home. Here's a related post by Phil Torrone on the MAKE blog.

Xeni visits the home of Kinetic Steam Works, a group of retro-tech industrial artisans who "repurpose the artifacts of clockwork modernity," and bring new life to very old steam engines. In doing so, they preserve what many consider a dying form of technology. From the group's description of its work:

What we found were machines, simple and intricate, that blurred the line between art and industry, kinetic masterpieces created during an era of diabolical innovation and gleeful invention. The steam engine embodied the ideologies, desires and dreams of its era, of Jules Verne and H.G. Wells, a bright and shining future where technology was built by hand. They were the aspirational finned cars and rockets of their day. Most recently, steam's fantastic has been represented by romantic industrial arts and the literary movements of retro sci-fi, steampunk, and gothic neo-Victorianism. The arch modernity of the steam driven Industrial Revolution is a powerful metaphor that explores our present and future through the nostalgic and dystopic past.

Special thanks to Josh Keppel and Mark Oltz for additional footage of these steampunk machine beauties in action.

In today's edition of Boing Boing tv, we continue our ongoing series of conversations with automotive engineering guru and multiple land speed record-holder Gale Banks, known to many as the godfather of speed. Today -- Banks shares insight on diesel and the DIY revolution.

Banks is an advisor to the Automotive X Prize, and the guy Jay Leno calls when he wants to double the muscle of an 810-horsepower racecar.(special thanks, Ruth and Coop)

See also:

Extreme Diesel Truck Racing

Car Hacking with Gale Banks

A mashup of selected shorts from "Film Racing," an annual contest in which independent filmmaker teams from 10 cities around the US must each produce a 4-minute digital film in exactly 12 hours. Also, a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle squares off with, um, an actual turtle. (Thanks, Charlie Weisman!)

Previously on Boing Boing: 24-hour Movie People.

Diesel is receiving much attention as an earth-friendlier fuel -- but for automotive engineering guru and multiple land speed record-holder Gale Banks, it's all about speed. We check out the Banks Sidewinder, known as the world's first roadracing diesel truck. The twin-turbocharged, diesel-powered endurance road-racing pickup can go over 222 mph. Banks is an advisor to the Automotive X Prize, and the guy Jay Leno calls when he wants to double the muscle of an 810-horsepower racecar. (special thanks, Ruth and Coop)

Xeni visits a tissue culturing workshop at Machine Project in Los Angeles. Oron Catts and Ionat Zurr of the bio-art collective SymbioticA in Australia teach us how to extract stem cells from bovine bones, and grow a clump of tasty tissue, some spare ears, or a set of pig wings in a petri dish -- in just 9 short months.

(music: Laura Lopez)

Xeni introduces us to the amazing flying machines of Carl Rankin -- they're made from unusual materials, like drinking straws, tape, thread, even restaurant take-out boxes. The "Jules Verne" looks more like a clipper ship than a radio-controlled model plane. Next, you've seen claymation, but -- dough-mation? "Behold the Wonder," a short film by Ben Rodkin.

Mark's exploration of Mister Jalopy's drive-in movie theater on a bicycle starts out normal enough, but gets pretty trippy when Jalopy opens the lid. Care Bears, orangutans, and Mister Rogers all make cameo appearances. All of this magic took place at a "mini Maker Faire" during Felt Club 2007, an annual exposition of cool crap made by interesting people. When the buzz wears off, we step into the Beijing Accelerator. Rotterdam-based artist Marnix de Nijs created this immersive virtual reality experience in which a seated user rotates at the same speed as the landscape they're viewing. This, too, is trippy. Coop suggests that it be known as "Barf Barf Revolution."

CRAFT Magazine editor Carla Sinclair (who co-founded the original bOING bOING zine) gives us a tour of Felt Club 2007, an annual showcase of cool handmade crafts.

Austrian tech-art-pranksters Monochrom show us how to hack into the human brain using a vintage calculator, duct tape, a USB drive, and some pickled onions (preferably Romanian). Then, Mark shows us how to make a very simple motor -- another fun project from scitoys.com.

See also: BBtv: Monochrom's love song for Lessig

Update: here's monochrom's extended dance remix director's uncut version of BRAICIN: Link.

Mark shows us how to make an explosive miniature cannon out of some Binaca and an empty film canister (don't try this at an airport, folks). Then, good foods gone bad -- an excerpt from "Snack Mansion," a claymation film by Lauren Adolfsen. When the pizza makes out with the cookie, and the banana barfs, you know it's a party.

Mark checks out a 15-times-larger-than-life Atari joystick replica by Jason Torchinsky, on display at Felt Club XL. Then, 8-bit help for those suffering from projectile dysfunction disorder.

Roaches are gross. Robots are good. But -- cockroch-controlled robots? Roboticist Garnet Hertz made one, and we visit him and his roachbot today. Then, a short film from Walter Robot (aka: Bill Barminski and Christopher Louie) about a broken hearted 'bot who ends up having a different kind of close encounter.

Mad professor Mark Frauenfelder shows us how to make a Curie Effect Magnetic Heat Engine from common household items. Then, Austrian art-pranksters Monochrom sing a song of love for Stanford law prof and famed copyright reform advocate Lawrence Lessig.

Xeni visits BarCamp LA and trys out the work of wearable computing designer "Robo," known to humans as Ross Bochnek. Next, sneaky use expert and garage inventor Cy Tymony swings by Xeni's house -- Xeni's elderly Sicilian neighbor falls in love with the robot Cy constructed out of trash and knicknacks from the 99 cent store.

(Special thanks to Crystal and Jason "Boogah" Cosper and all the BarCamp organizers!)

Mark visits the garage and workshop of "professional amateur" Mister Jalopy, who builds neat things from materials he scavenges from swap meets and garage sales. Mister Jalopy is a connoisseur of fine machine junque and curiosities, and he takes us on a guided tour of some of his most recent retro-mechanical creations and discoveries.

In today's Boing Boing tv episode, Mark Frauenfelder wanders through Maker Faire in search of interesting robots. First, we meet Babbling Head (an animatronic skull that sings sea shanties), Froggo (a weird slimy kitschy creature 'bot with a squid beak for a mouth), and Seeker Robot (GPS-autonomous RoboMagellan contestant), all creations of Eric Lundquist. Then, we stop by Bleeplabs, and listen to strange sounds emanating from a simple (but cute) analog synthesizer. If you dig today's show, you might also enjoy this previous BBtv episode with cool stuff from Maker Faire '07.

What kind of DIY tech wonders can you find at Maker Faire? Make Magazine editor-in-chief and BBtv co-host Mark Frauenfelder traveled to Austin, TX with camcorder in hand to show us. Mark introduces us to a ticklish dinosaur robot named Pleo (above), and a guy named Craig who makes amazing garage-tech musical instruments. (XJ)

Simpsons director David Silverman plays his flaming tuba for us. He built the propane-fueled "Tubatron" himself with help from pyro expert pals, and he puffs out a few bars of the Simpsons theme song. You can catch him and the flammable sousaphone in action at parades from time to time, and every year at Burning Man. (0:00-2:30)

And finally, a (cough) happy ending for the week: BB co-editor Mark Frauenfelder visited the Los Angeles Zoo and watched a zookeeper massage a grateful Tapir. We should all be as blissed-out as this odd-toed ungulate. (2:47-3:28)

-- XJ

Mark talks to Mister Jalopy, a guy who scavenges the world for discarded treasures, often creating some treasures of his own. He shows us the "museum in a jar" he discovered at an LA garage sale. (@0:09-3:38)

And during a trip to Mister Jalopy's garage of delights, Eric Jon Kurland shows off his homemade 3-D movie camera made from scavenged parts, and gets into a stereoscopic camcorder duel with BBtv producer Nihar Patel. (@3:54-end).

The military industrial complex can be fun! Tanks-A-Lot in England rents tanks for corporate events, and sexy time events, too. And Mark built a robot that violates none of Asimov's laws of robotics.

Coffee aficionado Mark Frauenfelder demonstrates his favorite portable coffee maker, the Aeropress, and makes a delicious cup of methamphetamine-free espresso (Intelligentsia Coffee's "Black Cat" variety, to be precise). While you're enjoying that first cup, watch this mesmerizing gogo dancer, Miss Foxie Moxie.

If you're enjoying BBtv and care to add a review on iTunes, where we're a (very) newly-listed show, we'd be most grateful! iTunes Link.

Xeni talks to philanthropist and Microsoft co-founder Paul G. Allen about The Allen Telescope Array, a $50 million astronomy project 6 years in the making that expands the search for extra-terrestrial life. Allen joins researchers from the SETI Institute and UC Berkeley today in Hat Creek, California, to announce that the first phase of the ATA is complete -- 42 of an eventual 350 radio dishes are now active and collecting scientific data from the universe.

Also in today's episode (starting at 4:44), mad professor Mark Frauenfelder dons his lab coat to demonstrate a peculiar sound instrument he made - a "boing box." Mark shows you how to make one yourself! He found the plans on bizarrelabs.com. Learn more in the next issue of MAKE magazine.

And! BBtv has an insanely cool, all-new intro animation, designed by Syd Garon (did the animated feature "DJ Qbert's Wave Twisters," "Somebody Goofed," and "Jack Chick's Titanic") with art from Adam Koford (did hobos! monkeys! laugh out loud cats!). Can you spot all the iconic BB elements in the subliminally speedy montage? Includes goatse and AACS keys, vulcans and tikis, sad popsicles and 8-bit unicorns, EFF and NSA, and much much more. Sound in that intro clip is by Carlos Bêla of Golden Shower, and logo critters by eBoy.