Comment by iancmceachern

All the responses, most of which I've seen are great, are very software focused. I get it, makes sense for HN. There is a whole world of hardware in this space. Learning how to design mechanisms that work, and last. Custom motors, controllers, actuators, hardware.

For that there are some great points of entry now. Places like pololu robotics, Adafruit, sparkfun, etc. are all as good as ever and are great jumping off points into building and eventually designing hardware.