Charlie Schick

Illustrations were adapted from:
- "ua741 IC, produced 1972 by Signetics Corp" by Teravolt
- "Signetics NE555N, the original 555 type oscillator, in a dual-in-line plastic package, manufactured in 1978" by Stefan506

The proper citations are too long to list, sorry, so, available upon request.

More variations. This one with the Signetics logos and two iconic products of theirs: the NE555 timer and the µA741 op-amp.

On the shirts, I have variants with a large design, or small as a chest badge.

Of course, I draw these as I think they are cool. Real question is if others think so, too. 😁

this is my fave comment - so many others are in negative relation to today.

for tinkering, indeed, it's just cool to do the mental and physical gymnastics to use some old tech.

for life, well, I am quite wedded to my plasma TV and have had to revive it with boards of eBay at least 3 times, ahah

Did Qualcomm kill Arduino for good? | Molecularist The maker community worried Qualcomm would kill the Arduino ethos. New T&Cs confirm the community's worst fears. Here's what's at stake, what Qualcomm got wrong, and what might still be salvaged.

They don't outright acknowledge the communication was broken, tho, and that they damaged the trust with makers. But they do re-affirm the principles that founded Arduino.

Still, everyone is now on guard. Let's see where things go.

My original article: www.molecularist.com/2025/11/did-...

The Arduino Terms of Service and Privacy Policy update: setting the record straight | Arduino Blog We’ve heard some questions and concerns following our recent Terms of Service and Privacy Policy updates. We are thankful our community cares enough to engage with us and we believe transparency and o...

Arduino came out with a clarification of the changes that so rattled the maker community.

The changes were related to cloud services (as many suggested). Everything that was open-licensed is still, there is no patent grab, or restrictions on reverse engineering.

blog.arduino.cc/2025/11/21/t...

p-koosh! mind blown. absolutely brilliant and subversive and beautiful and lovely. on so many levels.

In the spirit of Arduino news, here is a design I did of the Arduino Prototype 0, the legendary board that sparked a revolution in DIY electronics.

Ah, how far we've come.

Oddly, some Chinese company was asking about my trademarks in China for Molecularist a few months back. Guess now that's a company in China.

My first blog was called Cognections ('cognitive connections') - first on TypePad and then hosted myself. About 15 years ago, I changed to Molecularist (as in 'works with molecules').

Was about to take @molecularist.bsky.social but someone beat me to it (👋🏽).

molecularist.com

Oh, well. Likely not getting any more traffic related to that post, but good to clean things up that haven't been updated in a few years. And still a wee more to do.

Pause for station identification | Molecularist

Oy vey. My Arduino-Qualcomm post got picked up by the Adafruit blog yesterday (kiitos, @anneb.bsky.social) and my quiet personal blog (molecularist.com) got a ton of visitors I wasn't ready for. Today, I went around updating some pages, including this one.

www.molecularist.com/2025/11/paus...

Thanks, mate. Means a lot coming from you. 🙏🏽

The whole hand-drawn components and chips was inspired from that convo we all had back in the spring.

If you REALLY want this in black, navy, or grey - I can send you a discount code 😉

Citation: "Hand-drawn capacitors" adapted from "Capacitors" by Eric Schrader under CC BY-SA 2.0. "Hand-drawn capacitors" © 2025 by Grey and Slate, Haberdashers, is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Another time-lapse of one of my illustrations. Note the VitaminQ cap in the center. And are those variable caps to the right?

My challenge right now is to understand what designs folks would actually wear. The good news, there's someone out there with this design on a shirt of mine. Haha.

I was labeled ‘peripatetic’ by a professor who was visiting to give a seminar (we had a long discussion as I drove him to the airport). He used it in a sentence. And he was so right. Haha.

Did Qualcomm kill Arduino for good? | Molecularist The maker community worried Qualcomm would kill the Arduino ethos. New T&Cs confirm the community's worst fears. Here's what's at stake, what Qualcomm got wrong, and what might still be salvaged.

Drawing from community discussions across maker forums and sites addressing the whole Qualcomm-Arduino T&Cs change, here's what I see is at stake, what Qualcomm got wrong, and what might still be salvaged.

Comments welcome.

www.molecularist.com/2025/11/did-...

But We Had Music How, knowing that even the universe is dying, do we bear our lives? Most readily, through friendship, through connection, through co-creating the world we want to live in for the brief time we have…

www.themarginalian.org/2024/04/06/b...

I think you’ll dig Popova

Kids of hockey parents get skates at birth.
Kids of hardware parents route boards at birth.

Go, AdaBaby2!

Mosaic of things that draw life from light: finishing a project | Molecularist Finishing a project of things that draw life from light.

My obsession with my shirt designs and Etsy shop has meant not being in the workshop in a long time. ☹️ Maybe sharing some projects here will nudge me back.

This is one that was inspired by a line in a lovely book.

www.molecularist.com/2023/09/mosa...

Odd being back on the socials. I find myself reconstituting another more promising time as I find those from long ago in the interesting places of Bluesky.

Maybe not that close-knit era of early Twitter or Flickr, but warm echoes.

[Ok, been here only 10 days, so maybe I shouldn't get worked up 🙂]

New app! A compass that points to the centre of the galaxy Posted on Thursday 15 Feb 2024. 1,675 words, 12 links. By Matt Webb.

Cool. I've been using @genmon.fyi's app. interconnected.org/home/2024/02...

Recently, on a dark beach in Natucket, the Milky Way was so clear, the app showed straight ahead the gaping maw of Saggitarius A* with its 'its open-mouth kiss of oblivion' (quote @mariapopova.bsky.social). Sublime.

I’ve also been illustrating popular dev boards. Here’s the much loved Raspberry Pi PICO.

One really gets a good feel for the physical aspects board this way. Doing the castellations and holes required patience tho haha.

#buildvideo #raspi #devboard #maker

Bummer!

DIPs! And gotta love that chip with 'Happy' on it.

I too have 40+ years of stories - and also with my girlfriend now wife, friends, and children.

It’s gonna be missed.

It was the measure of all ice cream shops for me.

Let’s see if we get one last cup with mix-ins before it goes!

(I didn’t realize it was so new when were were in school)

Last challenge project: Tree of Life, with a twist | Molecularist In my final challenge project, I built a Tree of Life that twinkles thru the seasons. But with a twist.

Another oldie to share here. This project was part of a series in challenge a few years back.

A pretty one, the Neopixels cycle thru the season. The twist? The pixels get dementia.

Not sure anyone noticed Limewire was garbage - the value far outstripped the krappiness.

Tho didn’t Jobs call P2P music pirating ‘working for less than minimum wage’ or something like that?

Citation: Hand-drawn SID chips" adapted from "Two variants of 'SID' sound chips" by Taras Young under CC BY-SA 4.0. "Hand-drawn SID chips" © 2025 by Grey and Slate™, Haberdashers, is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Here's a time-lapse from Adobe Fresco, where I do all of my hand-drawn designs. I have an iPad Pro and Apple Pencil. I only use a few weights of vector pencils. I use that blaze orange for highlights.

These are versions of the famous #chiptune #SID chips from #MOS (6581) and #Commodore.