LittleBits founder Ayah Bdeir reflected on the road to littleBits with Maker Media founder Dale Dougherty during the 2018 Maker Faire. (Image via Forbes Middle East)
The 2018 Maker Faire held endless surprises for the hundreds of thousands of participants who packed into the New York Hall of Science in Queens last weekend. I was able to visit a handful of different talks and events there.
One of the keynote talks of the weekend was an interview with littleBits Founder and CEO Ayah Bdeir. She was interviewed by none other than Maker Media Founder and CEO Dale Dougherty, the father of the Maker Movement.
Early Years
Bdeir was born in Montreal, Quebec and grew up in Beirut, Lebanon. She commended her parents on their ability to truly nurture her passions and those of her siblings. From an early age, Bdeir loved making. She tinkered with tool kits, designing and building whatever her heart desired.
Bdier mentioned she never thought, “Oh, this is something only boys should do.” Bdeir is a huge advocate for getting more girls involved in STEM/STEAM, and believes her parents are a huge reason why she went into the sciences. Her parents never told her to go play with dolls. They helped foster the interests she held without judgment.
Bdeir’s love for tinkering spurred her to major in computer science, a path she found boring and rigid. Her parents encouraged her to finish her degree. She did, after which she completed a graduate degree at MIT’s Media Lab.
Eventually, Bdeir landed a job working in the financial district of New York City. She was bored and stressed, and wondered what in the world had become of her life.
The Humble Beginnings of littleBits
A few years after working in the industry, Bdeir won a fellowship at Eyebeam, where littleBits was born. When she began, Bdeir said she was just interested in exploring modular circuits. She had no money, and her early prototypes were built from cardboard and only worked if “you did not breathe on them. Otherwise, they fell apart.”
Still, Bdeir continued iterating. In 2009, she took her idea to the Maker Faire, where the dream to take littleBits to market was born.
Bdeir said she never really intended to commercialize littleBits. At the time, she took the modular circuits to the Faire simply because she thought they were cool. But the response of countless parents who showed intense interest in the platform made Bdeir realize she needed to commercialize the platform ASAP. After a couple of years of working through the kinks of mass manufacturing, the company was successfully launched in 2011.
Growing Pains
Bdeir never intended to be an entrepreneur. Early on, she said it was challenging to see her concept change from what she initially intended.
“When you create something, you have to let it go,” Bdier said.
She found her concepts began to take on lives of their own, which were different than her original concepts, but better than anything she could have created alone.
For aspiring tinkers, Bdeir offered advice on mindset:
She said challenges will arise. Nothing will turn out the way you think it will, but that’s OK. Always remember to be humble and seek out your community. People are willing to help if you are honest about what you don’t know and humble when you ask.
Just keep Trying
Bdeir and Dale Dougherty reflected on the difficulties of spearheading such monumental movements. Sometimes, they said, it’s hard to keep going.
For anyone feeling stuck, the makers reminded the audience life is tough no matter the path you choose. If you’re on the right path for you, however, you will find the joy in that work and continue moving forward.
Bdeir suggests maintaining a strong connection to the community to refuel. When she wants to quit, she watches videos of all the things children are creating with littleBits. Kids are so creative, Bdeir said, and make things she never dreamed of with the platform, including butterfly catching contraptions to LED-decorated tutus.
Breaking Gender Stereotypes
Forty percent of littleBits products are used by little girls – an incredibly high statistic for STEM-based products in the U.S. Bdeir said her team strives to make products that can be used by any child of any gender by lowering potential barriers to entry. The colors schemes, packaging, projects, and advertisements all keep this “secret mission” in mind to encourage any child with an interest in STEM to pursue it without intimidation.
Bdeir is fighting to continue to improve the statistics of littleBits users for an even 50/50 across boys and girls. She noted, however, that most girls lost interest in STEM around 12 years of age. This results in underrepresentation in science labs, board rooms, politics – equating to tremendous underrepresentation for urban planning, public policy, industry, and more. It’s everyone’s problem to solve.
Final Word
There are so many different kinds of work, it can be difficult to know which path to take. Bdeir said she found most people always ask you “what do you want to do?” She said that line of thinking doesn’t help you find joy. Instead, ask “What do I want to create?”
Then, of course, go make it.
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