Maker Faire Cairo, known for being the greatest Show and Tell festive gathering in the region, is an annual event that’s taken place for 4 years in a row now. It’s a family-friendly showcase of invention, creativity and resourcefulness, and a celebration of the Maker movement- a place where people show what they are making, and share what they are learning: from tech enthusiasts to crafters, homesteaders, scientists and garage tinkerers, they are of all ages and backgrounds. Each year MFC arrives with greater plans and more surprises, but MFC’18 was a game changer: MFC’18 went all regional. On the 10th of March, 2018, the Smart Village Club witnessed an clash of civilization as MFC’18 welcomed representatives of more than X countries of the MENA region, and even more international guests and speakers. Some of the highlights of the day was the participation of the renowned guests: Matt Richardson, the Raspberry Pi Foundation’s Executive Director, and David Cuartielles, the Arduino Co-founder.
Matt Richardson is responsible for furthering their charitable mission within North America. He’s a graduate of New York University’s Interactive Telecommunications Program and a former Contributing Editor at Make: Magazine. He is currently a columnist for The MagPi, the official Raspberry Pi community magazine and co-author of Getting Started with Raspberry Pi from Maker Media.
David Cuartielles’ work spans the fields of programming, education, research and product development. In 2005 David co-created the Open Hardware platform Arduino, which has become a leading platform for DIY electronics and which earned the team an Honorary Mention at the Ars Electronica Digital Community Prix 2006. Since the late nineties he has developed robotic, mobile and net based interactive art installations and open source tools for live performance and education. A passionate speaker on the how we can reform education through practically enabling children and young people to play and test, engineering ideas in partnership with peers and experts others. He works to enable such learning to take place through various initiatives including the CTC 101 education programme, the Ardunio community and his academic research at Malmö University. In 2016 he was awarded an Ashoka Foundation fellowship for his work in the field social entrepreneurship by means of open source technologies.