>> ITTY BITTY CITY - IoT BECOMES INTEROPERABLE WITH LEGO®

One for the "I wish I had this as a child growing up" department.

A lot of IoT projects want to remove the technical burden from IoT development - make an easier entry point for the non tech savvy. The folks over at microduino.cc have put their own spin on it by merging IoT with LEGO® - with a recently launched indiegogo campaign Itty Bitty City. It consists of eight projects to support all levels of makers, inventors and anyone who has an idea they want to bring to life with the child-winning LEGO® building-block foundation.

All of their modules and sensors have LEGO® style connectors for seamless integration into existing LEGO® products - but also removes the need for soldering and wires so you can focus on building the idea instead. To program the modules; two options are provided, the familiar Arduino IDE or using drag-n-drop programming solutions like Scratch and Mixly.

The modules are also color coded - to assist in understanding what they do. Red is for core, effectively the place where code exist, the brains of the project. Yellow is for function, such as providing input and output (sensors). Blue is for communication, like WiFi or BlueTooth and Green is for extension - to wire up your own components. They even provide a 850mAh Li-ion battery.

Other than the example projects implemented; what would this be practical for?

If you are a serious LEGO® fanatic and love the Technics brand; just imaging integrating this IoT technology into the Porsche 911 GT3 RS. I have seen one of these up front and personal; they are so detailed they even have their own working drive train and steering components. It would be possible to hook up a motor and servo and remotely control one of these.

I have already seen people do this using off the shelf Technics parts:

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iDiWFaD_XX0
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87gg9RwA3EU

Integrating the microduino's core and communication modules could make it very interesting.