Prototype (an acrostic poem)

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Putting together yet another try was one of the most satisfying things he did

Reaching down he snapped in the last fitting and took a breath, ready to see if it worked

Of course, building all these iterations was also one of the worst things he could do

They reminded him of the numerous failures he didn’t plan for, that he was a bad engineer

Only he knew there was almost zero chance that the first one would work out of the box

That was the stuff of myths, legends, and dumb luck

Yearning to know if this was the one, he flipped the on switch

Prepared for sparks to fly and flames to claim one more attempt

Except this time it didn’t burn.  It still didn’t work, but that was still progress?

Industry (an acrostic poem)

 

It all started with a glimmer of an idea

Not anything big, barely something you could see if you squinted

Dim as it was, someone saw the importance of it

Under their careful eyes, the idea grew and grew

Soon there was a prototype, then first generation

That morphed into a product that they could be proud of

Releasing it into the world to see how it would be received

Yet already working on what would come next

 

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Robot Artisan (a 150 word story)

As the 3D printer printed out another iteration of his robot’s body, Martin pondered if this method of construction could be considered hand crafted.  He had designed the robot shell in Autodesk Inventor, carefully putting in every curve and thickness.  He had precisely lined up the mounting holes so that all the electronics would fit perfectly with just enough space to make it relatively simple to assemble while making it look tight and tidy to an outside observer.  He had put the previous prototype together, piece by piece, including programming the behaviors himself.  He had molded those behaviors, creating new routines and shaving off excess commands till the code was beautifully efficient.

As Martin watched that previous prototype scurry along the floor, he decided it was hand crafted in this new digital age.  That means he could claim to be a robot artisan, and Martin like the sound of that.