That’s right, Benjamin J. Heckendorn (aka Ben Heck) has started churning out episodes of his own Internet TV show. We finally got around to watching the first episode and enjoyed it greatly. You’ll see him alter an Xbox 360 controller for a disabled gamer, making custom foot interfaces to take over the traditional role of your right hand. Also in the episode is part of a big build; making an Xbox 360 laptop out of the new slim model. We’re very interested in that overall build, but in this episode you only see him removing the components from the factory case. But we guess the promise of seeing the rest of the project is the hook to get you to watch the next episode.
Think that you haven’t heard of Ben Heck before? If you’ve been following Hackaday for a while you have. We’ve looked in on quite a few of his builds over the years, including his pinball machine, Xbox 360 portable, and his access controller.
I’ve been consistently impressed with his work. Glad to see he has a regular show now.
It was a great first show (i submitted this story to HaD)
Funny,I thought he would be older lol. But yes great to see he has his own show. Looking forward to more episodes,love his work!
ben heck does really, really nice work. the only fear i have is whether his work will become commercialized too much, which may cause his project choices to start blowing in the breeze.
in general i don’t like the fact that the people who make the most money in the US are those who entertain rather than those who innovate or produce. we have our heads up our collective asses; we could be doing so much more with our shared human experience but nooooo… we wanna play and masturbate… f’in hedonists
<< hedonist/hacker
@Dan Fruzzetti
a lot of innovators do get paid by the boat load, however their labor is not publicized, mostly because they’re bound by NDAs. By comparison it’s the nature of the entertainment industry to to promote their members, which is why they seem to be more predominant.
People like Ben Heck are the innovator equivalent of an indy film maker.
>Funny,I thought he would be older lol
me too lol
His soldering skills pwned mine :P
@Dan Fruzzetti, very true and completely agree with you about disliking how those who entertain make more money than those who innovate, just look at Kipkay, someone who’s very good at making hacking videos, but often relies on using other people’s ideas for ‘his’ projects he makes money from.
It’s great to see some proper DIY back on Rev3 again after they (Patrick) killed Systm just when it looked like it was going to get more and more interesting since the robot guy David Calkins started co-hosting episodes.
My only gripe is that because it’s the ‘console king’ Ben Heck, it looks like every build/hack/mod is going to be console/gaming related.
This is _SO_ awesome! :D
Cool, like Norm from This Old House / Yankee Workshop.
This Old Gadget?
Meh, personally I’ve always found his modding to be pretty average at best. The on;y thing that sets him apart is that he makes decent cases for them sometimes.
Yeah Ben Heck mostly does video game related hacks. What alot of people do not realize, Ben heck already been recognize by Disability groups for his work on the 1 Handed Controller and One of his hacks,and his Xbox 360 and PS3 Controller Monitor hacks as been used my game studios to help test there games, MW2 for example.
It’s interesting to see his approach to things.
“I’ve always found his modding to be pretty average at best. The on;y thing that sets him apart is that he makes decent cases for them sometimes.”
Well then please tell us who is better?
Anyone?
Pretty sure you have to be on TV to have a TV show. Just sayin’