Digital Open Winners: From pocket-sized Altoids tin hack, big dreams emerge

'll meet awesome 16 year old Nick Brenn. His crafty Altoids tin hacks led to a winning "Electronikits" project for the Digital Open, which sells electronics kits for pocket-sized tin-mod flashlights and other DIY oddities.

I loved his answer to the "Who is this project for?" part of the Digital Open Questionnaire: "Anyone with a passion for being a DIY-er and a fiend for building cool projects. Who wouldn't want a sweet Altoids LED Flashlight? You could have the freshest flashlight on the block! Or an Altoids night-light! It is rare to find someone with such cool projects as you would have!"

Nick tells us more about how "Electronikits" came to be, below and after the jump: It all started with instructions that I posted on Instructables.com, on how to build a "Super Awesome Altoids MINI Flashlight." Soon after winning a contest on Instructables, I was contacted by a sales associate at the science supply company Edmund Scientific. I was like, "WOW!", someone wants to buy kits from me that I don't even have! This was an opportunity too good to pass up. I created my business known as NGB Enterprises. To sell to Edmunds, I needed a tax i.d, and since I was a minor, I created a "dba" (doing business as), under my mom's business. So in just months, I had established a business based on instructions I submitted that could be viewed by the whole world! So I then bought the necessary components for the kits that Edmunds wanted to buy, and I shipped them out to the company. I was paid, I had a profit and life was good! I wanted to keep this going, and I did not want this to be a one time thing. So in order to keep with "openness," I did not take down the instructions that I posted on the Instructables website, because I was confident that I did not have to worry about anyone trying to do something silly with my work, and I used those instructions for my kits.

Read more of Nick's story here, with links to features about his projects at HowStuffWorks and other science-y sites.

Read more about the youth competition in IFTF's press release announcing Digital Open winners.

Previously: Digital Open Winner: A Living Diorama, to Change the World. Digital Open Winner: teen creates a robot shop Digital Open Winners: "Hybrid Airship," by teen robotic blimp builders. BB Video: IFTF, Sun, and Boing Boing Launch Digital Open Youth ... Digital Open: online tech expo for young people - Boing Boing Digital Open tech innovation expo for global youth: 10 more days ...

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