MakeWithTech Community Goes Live

Irv Shapiro -

It has been an exciting journey over the past few years.   After posting my first video about turning a pen on a lathe in November 2018, I have posted another 243 videos and attracted over 70,000 subscribers watching over 5 million videos.  The journey was not without challenges.   Initially branded as the DrVAX channel, a nickname I had when working with VAX/VMS computers at Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) in the 1980s, I ran into the buzzsaw of Covid.  Suddenly anything with "vaccination" or even "VAX" in the name was controversial.  So rebranding as MakeWithTech, I continued the journey.

A couple of years ago, as the YouTube channel grew, I could not respond to every comment.   With a goal of "learning together," I was committed to helping regular people become  "DIYers," who today are called "makers."   This led to the creation of forum.makewithtech.com, a place for folks to exchange ideas and help each other.   With more than 3,000 registered users, our user community continues to grow.

Then a year ago, I became frustrated that the 3d model customizer on Thingiverse never seemed to work reliably.  So I put on my coding hat to see how hard it would be to create an online OpenSCAD customizer.  Our template-based, custom 3d model site, models.makewithtech.com, was born.  This site has also grown to thousands of registered users and recently launched a premium subscription model for advanced users.

Looking over the MakeWithTech community 6 months ago, I decided it was time to "kick it up a notch." So I hired virtual staff worldwide and devised plans to relaunch an integrated learning community.  

The new MakeWithTech community will be launched in the coming weeks.  It includes a new MakeWithTech blog and educational site, updated forum software, and the release of Version 1.0 of models.makewithtech.com.   Models.makewithtech.com is now much more than a place to select and customize a 3d template, including a complete online OpenSCAD development environment, model sharing, and a tipping system for template creators.

So head to makewithtech.com, forum.makewithtech.com, and models.makewithtech.com and join the community.