Logiblocs

I met the founder of Logiblocs yesterday. I'd never seen this plug and play, electronics and logic building block system before. It's like Lego Mindstorms but on a much lower level; AND gates and signals, rather than programming icons. The blocks are friendly colours and nicely translucent, and as well as hands-on building you can do simulations on a PC or Mac. There are energy blocks, input sensors, output devices, wires, logic gates, delays and so on. There's also a robot kit.

Apparently it's huge in France, but hasn't really taken off over here. I felt embarrassed that I didn't know about it - the company has been going for 10 years! - but at least I've seen it now.

Although it's clear that part of the company aim is to bring electronics, and the real basics of programming, to kids who would otherwise be unaware of these concepts, I was somewhat disappointed to see that the upcoming range of products, "Logimen", are mostly fighting machines, equipped with weapons and a backstory about how the world has collapsed into war. (There are some civilian Logimen, too, but they too are living in a battle-torn land.) These seem very masculine, and less inclusive than the generic kits. Ho hum.