Image: Twitter
I have to admit, the first time I heard of Twitter I didn’t quite understand the purpose. I’m not entirely sure that I understand it now, but I do use and enjoy twitter. I have had fun searching out and finding interesting people to follow and converse with. Most of the GeekDads are now active on Twitter and we share comments about posts, pointers to cool resources, and converse with many readers and fellow geeks.
I had slowly built up a “Robots” group in TweetDeck and Ken’s 100 Geeks to Follow post got me thinking that I should do a similar post, but limit it to robot geeks. Since then I’ve expanded the list to 52 mostly interesting and not too redundant robot geeks who tweet. I found a few people through Twitter’s oft-broken search feature, but most of them were discovered via word of tweet, or from links on blogs I already read. There appear to be an infinite number of spam bots, twitterbots, auto-follow robots, and other tools adding noise to the “robot” keyword. Even when search was working well I’d get 100 script-bot tweets for every real robot tweet.
So here’s my list of 52 robot geeks. I have included a mix of individuals, blogs, robotics teams, companies and stores. Then to round out the list I tossed in a few things we don’t often think of as robots: CNC machines and 3D printers. I have also included a number of FRC teams. FRC is an acronym for FIRST Robotics Competition and FIRST is an acronym for the Foundation for the Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology.
This list is far from complete, so please feel free to recommend more in the comments. We at GeekDad are considering adding some directory pages that may include lists like this one.
| Name | Twitter ID | Robot Cred |
|---|---|---|
| AIMEC:3 | AIMEC_Robot | A REAL Robot being developed at the MABB’s lab in the UK |
| Shawn Augustson | ArduinoFun | Arduino robots and more, good projects for the kids. |
| BattleBots | battlebots | Does this one really need a description? |
| FRC-1515 | BHrobotics1515 | Beverly Hills High School Robotics team #1515 (FRC). |
| BotJunkie | BotJunkie | The official BotJunkie.com Twitter feed for live event coverage and other roboty stuff |
| Bre Pettis | bre | Maker of the makerbot and overall fan of robots, suspected of affiliating with @ResistSkynet |
| Name | Twitter ID | Robot Cred |
|---|---|---|
| Cyborg Camp | cyborgcamp | An “unconference” for the future of humans and technology in Portland, Oregon |
| Todd, Dan, and Brett | engineeringmind | A couple of engineers from NI talking about engineering. |
| Rob Spence | eyeborg | Building a bionic eye, watch out! Not exactly robotics, but close enough for me. |
| UncleFishbit’s Robot | FishbitsRobot | Fishbits claims to be a sad robot. He mostly links to robot news, art, and articles. |
| FRC-604 | frc604 | The Leland Robotics Team, Team Quixilver 604, participates in the FIRST Robotics Competition. |
| William Cox | gallamine | Blogs at GoRobotics.net and is a fan of robots. |
| Grant Imahara | grantimahara | Grant from Mythbusters, also a serious robot geek. |
| Hamilton Robotics | HamiltonRobotic | Makers of industrial liquid handling robots. Not exactly hobbiest kinda stuff, but interesting anyway. |
| HEXBUGs | HEXBUG | Micro Robotic Creatures. HEXBUGs are small inexpensive robotic toys made by my employer. |
| IITRobotics | IITRobotics | Bio Robotics club at Illinois Institute of Technology. |
| National Instruments | LABView | A couple of engineers from NI talking about LABView. |
| Makerbot Industries | makerbot | Inexpensive open-source 3D printer. A 3D printer that you can build for under $1000. Much lower resolution than the new Objet, but also 1/100th the cost. |
| MarsPhoenix | MarsPhoenix | The Mars Phoenix Lander. Now asleep for the winter, it remains to be seen if Phoenix can rise from the frost next spring. |
| Scott Maxwell | MarsRoverDriver | Beyond cool, Scott drives robots on another planet. |
| Spirit and Opportunity | MarsRovers | Spirit and Oppy, the Mars Rovers tweet their status and link to some awesome pictures. |
| Greg Munson | megagreg | Co-Creator of BattleBots. Plenty of news from the BattleBot circuit. |
| Simone | MissySB | All robots, all the time. Except when it’s not. |
| Microsoft | MSRobotics | Microsoft Robotics group. I just hope their critical robots don’t BSoD. |
| National Instruments | niweek | Tweets about NIWeek, a conference in Austin about most things NI (National Intruments) which I will be attending. |
| Human Resistance | ResistSkynet | Dedicated to stopping Skynet Research. (See also @SkynewResearch below.) |
| RMT Robotics | RMTRobotics | Industrial robotics for materials handling. |
| Robo Community | robocommunity | Official WoeWee Robot Community |
| Greg Needel | RoboGreg | FIRST Team Mentor, Blogger, DIYer, Combat builder, Mechanical Engineer and Robot Geek. Also a fan of the GigaPan and VEX. |
| Robot A Day | Robotaday | Building a robot army, one bot at a time. Also a cool blog. |
| Brighton Robotics | robotbrighton | A robot enthusiasts group based in Brighton |
| Carl Leonard | robotcast | Video podcast for hobbyists. |
| Robot Comics | robotcomics | Digital comics for iPhone, iPod Touch, Android, Kindle and more |
| Robotics And Beyond | RoboticsBeyond | Robotics Summer Camp in Connecticut. |
| robots.net | robotsdotnet | Robot news from Dallas, finds a lot of cool links and projects. |
| Lem Fugitt | robots_dreams | Robot technologist living in Japan |
| Robots Forever | robots_forever | Infrequent robot sightings and news blurbs. |
| How To Web | robots | Lots of pointers to robots of all sorts, from DIY to industrial to cutting edge research and back. |
| Robot Uprising | robotuprising | The Robots Are Revolting! |
| ShopBot | ShopBot | CNC routers and machines. Too expensive for most hobbyists, but it is fun to dream and take ideas for some CNC DIY. |
| Keith Kleiner | singularityhub | Singularity Hub is a blog and twitter feed covering the latest in robotics, human enhancement, genetics, nanotech, longevity, AI, the brain, etc. |
| Skynet Research | skynetresearch | I get the feeling that this is viral marketing for something, maybe makerbot, but I haven’t dug enough to tell for sure. |
| Spark Fun | SparkFun | SparkFun is a cool company that caters to the MAKE community with open source circuit boards, parts, sensors, and much more. |
| Steevithak | steevithak | Intersting, and to the point. He enjoys building, talking, talking, writing, and photographing robots. |
| Southwest Robotics | swrobotics | Southwest Robotics Team, FRC Team #2129 |
| FRC-930 | team930 | FIRST Robotics Team 930 is Twitter! Follow the Mukwonago BEARs. |
| The Blue Alliance | thebluealliance | The Blue Alliance maintains stats on regional and championship competitions with complete records going back to 2005. |
| Robot Uprising! | theyarecoming | Humorous and insightful news about the inevitable rise of our bloodthirsty robotic overlords. |
| TORC | torctech | Building systems for the development of unmanned and autonomous vehicles. Not exactly something the hobbiest would afford but still very interesting. |
| Tony Ellis | Toymaker2 | Toy maker, inventor and Robotics AI developer |
| Trossen Robotics | trossenrobotics | Keep up to date in the robotics world! This is worth watching for their pointer posts. They seemt to find a lot of cool robot ideas online. |
| VEXRobotics | vexrobotics | VEX is just getting started on twitter, but plans to include new product announcements, competition standings, and cool youtube videos featuring VEX. |
