It's just over one month away from the third annual Rhode Island Mini Maker Faire, and Kipp Bradford and I are once again working with the great folks at WaterFire to pull this event together.

The original Maker Faire (which is put on by my employer, O'Reilly Media) started in 2006 in San Mateo (right near San Francisco International Airport), and gets better every year. With about 20k attendees the first year, Maker Faire Bay Area has grown to 100k attendees in 2011. It's huge. And on top of that, Maker Faire Detroit and World Maker Faire New York are in their second years.

These tens of thousands of attendees come to see robots, life-sized games, science projects, kinetic art, human-powered rides, electronics, but also to think about reuse, sustainability, and education.

Mini Maker Faire Rhode Island is one of several Mini Maker Faires: there's North Carolina, Ann Arbor, and many more.

And now, it's easier than ever to make your own Maker Faire. In the true DIY spirit, MAKE has created a guide to making a Maker Faire, which includes lots of planning tips, ideas for what works, and information on the (short) licensing agreement you need to agree to in order to use the Maker Faire name.

This year, Mini Maker Faire Rhode Island takes place on September 10, 2011, on Steeple Street during that evening's WaterFire. It's free to attend, and it's free to exhibit. If you have a project that you'd like to exhibit, please use this form. Maker Faires are made of makers!

And if you have any other questions, comments or suggestions, please contact me.

(CC-licensed photo by johngineer from the RI Mini Maker Faire flickr Pool. Some rights reserved)