Bricks LA and the Great Ball Contraption

Admittedly, I'm a starter. I love starting new projects, especially those that involve making something, and those that involve engaging with those who might make that something. I create a scavenger hunt for community of a very specific sort, and reach out via the Internet through a mechanism I've developed. It's called The Community Lemonade Game.

This time, we're building a Great Ball Contraption Building Community. That may sound confusing, but here's the logic. A Great Ball Contraption presented one time has limited benefit. It would engage and certainly provide many opportunities for learning through observation. Of course videos taken of the contraption would greatly extend the benefit.

A Great Ball Contraption Building Community can come together over and over again at event after event, each time building some new contraption or some different contraption. Each person bringing his/her module to make some cool new assembly of GBC modules. An assembly that might work... Or not. The goal is the community, not necessarily the working contraption. That will come later.

How does one gather a GBC Building Community? Well, if you are building your GBC in LEGO® bricks, you should definitely reach out to the LEGO forums! I have done just that, and netted a couple of interested LEGO® enthusiasts. Two is a good start! Then you reach out to your local community. You may have created opportunities for engagement with them before - your friends, your acquaintances, your neighbors - but this is a specific opportunity for engaement. You never know who you will get. I've got a couple more around me.

But then, as I've quoted before 'The Barrier of entry to GBC building is quite high.' This was from the mouth of a teenager who was sitting with the GBCs at Bricks by the Bay, a LEGO® Fan Con in the Bay Area. It's one thing to admire them and another to actually build them.

Enter the GBC Flash Mob. It's ambitious, that's for sure! The idea is that we would issue the GBC Flash Mob call on the GBC Flash Mob facebook page. All you GBCers and wanna be GBCers out there would respond to the call. On the designated day, at the designated time, everyone gathers with their module and Voila, GBC. Working? Maybe! The first year it might be a little - let's say - under subscribed. Over time, surely they will come! Who doesn't love a GBC? Who doesn't want to learn how to build a GBC module?

The GBC Flash Mob solves another problem. Another entrant for event organizers of geek events like comic cons, STEM and STEAM conventions and school and city events, Maker Faires put on by schools, colleges and libraries. An organic entry for which a call can be placed and any individual in the group could respond. That's the idea anyway. And who wouldn't want to have a GBC at their event? To be extra sure that the call would be successful, it would be in the event organizer's interests to start a GBC club or activity or class at his/her school, college, library. That way he/she would be guaranteed to have some small presence from the call, and the opportunity for ALL the GBC Flash Mobbers to answer the call.

That's the idea, anyway.

So, all you GBC lovers, GBC module builders and GBC Flash Mobbers, come on by to Bricks LA LEGO® Fan Con at the Pasadena Convention Center on January 5 and 6 to participate in the first ever GBC Flash Mob. Specific time details at the event, probably around 2 PM. We'll have a little building experience for those who haven't brought a module. How many of us will there be? That, my friend is a very good question.

Please note that there is a $5 per person entry fee for Bricks LA. Kids under 5 are free!

Trish Tsoiasue is a community builder based in Long Beach, California . She builds socially responsible, grassroots communities, believes in the power of play, has many hobbies and interests, and lots and lots of ideas. She is trained in LEGO® Serious Play and the Creative Problem Solving Institute's methods of intentional creativity. The communities she has created and in which she takes most pride are the Long Beach LEGO® User Group, Makersville and the (new) Leading Edge Multi-National Games, which she prototyped in 2018. She is the inventor of the Community Lemonade Game, a mechanism for path finding and problem solving that she plays. She's convinced that one day you will play it too. You can find her experiential videos on her Squigglemom YouTube channel (please subscribe!), and when she's not blogging on the Patch, she's blogging on Squigglemom.net.