Hardware hacking for fun and profit

We're used to creating systems that create millions of web pages, database rows and files every day. But our code rarely makes anything happen in the physical world beyond blinking a few lights in a server room somewhere. The good news is that the kind of electronic components that drive your washing machine, your car, your entertainment system and your giant killer robots are now ridiculously cheap, easy to program and come with convenient USB sockets. This talk will guide you through the basic of making your own devices using the Arduino platform and open-source software, and demonstrate a few reasons why you might want to do so.