Originally posted by MET student Kevin Andrews on 03/06/2017
Let you and your kids build real mechanical computers!
We all need to detox from our screens and computers. It is a common fact that the amount of time children spend glued to a screen has risen dramatcally in the last 20 years and to make matters worse children are also now multi-screening – using more than one device at the same time. The question now becomes how can we keep kids engaged and excited to learn while programming without having them in front of a glaring device? Enter Turning Tumble, a mechanical board game created by programmer Paul Boswell – he’s well known for programming complex games for Texas Instruments calculators – and maker Alyssa Boswell, the Turing Tumble lets you use small parts to create logic flows in order to solve puzzles. It’s multi-tasking without the multi-screens.
The game is simple. The set of marbles roll one at a time from the top of the board through a series of pins and “logic” pieces. When the marble hits a flipper at the bottom it releases another ball – creating a computing cycle.
Players add logic to the game board by placing six different types of parts onto the board. The ‘Bit’ is a particularly important one. Each time a ball runs over it, it flips to point the opposite direction. Pointing to the left is like a ‘0’, and pointing to the right is like a ‘1.’ Gear bits are the most interesting part, though. Gear bits are just like bits, except that they can be connected to one another so that when one is flipped, it flips the connected gear bits, too. It’s these parts that make the computer Turing-complete.
The important thing to remember is all of this is presented in the guise of a puzzle game. A book includes 51 games that teach kids how to make XOR gates and other computing principles.
The project is entirely bootstrapped and the pair hopes to raise $48,000 to start building the game.
Boswell created the game to teach everyone how to program. It rose out of frustration. In his work at the University of Minnesota he found himself stuck with scientists who couldn’t manage programming or computational analysis.
I would invest in this product. This is a great venture pitch and it offers all the information an EVA needs.
1. Championship: It is clearly presented the creator knows the product and the relevant areas well. The way the presenter briefly mentioned his education background without going on about his past experience is a great touch to it.
2. Differentiation: This is a unique product, especially judging that most similar products on the markets are more app based, it actually offers potential consumers a different choice.
3. Marketability: Though I’m not convince that adults would purchase this product for their own use, I am interested in the part where this could be a product that the whole family can play with.
4. Venture concept: Turing Tumble isn’t an original idea but its approach to present the same idea and the delivery is very different. The story is also compelling.
I would not invest in this business as it only fulfills 2/4 of the criteria.
1. CEO and Team: Credibility is there. The designer is from a Texas Instruments and designs complex games. That is a major selling factor.
2. Venture Concept: The pitch is compelling enough as it uses basic computing concepts and the designer created a game that can have various degrees of complexity. It is very educational.
3. Marketability and Venture Plan: This was not discussed in the pitch. As an investor, we need to see the possible returns and how robust the business model is or if the current business model being put forward can be improved.
If I were just considering the first and second criteria, I would invest. However, I also have to think about the financial aspect as I am a potential investor.