The Robotics Invention System (RIS) was the flagship product of the first generation of the Lego Mindstorms line. It is a commercialization of technology produced by the MIT Media Lab in collaboration with the LEGO group. The RIS featured the programmable Robotic Command eXplorer (RCX) microcontroller, as well as 9V Lego-compatible motors and sensors and a selection of Lego parts. The original RIS was launched fall of 1998. It was replaced by a second version, RIS 1.5, in the summer of 1999; and a third version, RIS 2.0, in 2001.
Development of Mindstorms Brand The Lego Mindstorms product line was the first project of "Home Education", a division of
Lego Education established by employee Tormod Askildsen in 1995. Askildsen, who had previously spent ten years working for Lego Education, had grown frustrated working with teaching professionals and wanted to create an improved educational experience that was delivered directly towards children. Home Education decided to incorporate technology into their products based on
market research that concluded that children found learning that involved technology interesting. Lego Mindstorms started development in April 1996. The concept for the set was based on technology created in partnership with the MIT Media Lab. MIT Media Lab had been experimenting with combining Lego and programming since the early 1980s, and Lego had previously commercialized some of this technology as classroom products in the
Lego Dacta line. The programmable brick (or pbrick Lego had been interested in mass-producing the pbrick since its creation in the 1980s, but at the time it was considered unfeasible due to the lack of computers in schools and households and the relative expense of electrical components. The project's at-first low profile allowed the Mindstorms team the freedom to develop the product using operating procedures then-unorthodox to the Lego Group. The physical programmable brick was re-engineered from the ground up, as the experimental programmable bricks were not designed for robustness or cost-effective manufacturing. The Mindstorms product was launched concurrently with the Cybermaster, another Lego product spun off from the MIT programmable brick technology that was more in line with the traditional product philosophies of the Lego group. at a retail price of $199. Instead of being sold at toy stores, the product was sold at electronics stores like
Best Buy and
CompUSA, due to the relatively high cost of the set.) sold out within 3 months. The second edition of the RIS, Robotics Invention System 1.5, was released in the summer of 1999,{{cite web
Fanbase and "Right-to-Hack" Despite being aimed towards children, the Robotics Invention System quickly found an audience with adults and hackers of all ages; Lego company surveys conducted a few months after launch determined that seventy percent of Lego Mindstorms Hobbyists were adults. Shortly following the product's launch, adult hobbyists began sharing reverse-engineered versions of the RCX brick's
Microcode and
Firmware on the internet, leading to the development of alternative programming languages for the RCX such as "Not Quite C" (NQC) and alternative operating systems for the brick like lejOS. The Lego Group briefly considered sending cease-and-desist letters to websites sharing the RCX's proprietary code. However, The Mindstorms team successfully argued that the embrace of the product by the hacking community proved that the product was worth developing. In order to foster this burgeoning community, an official forum was established on the Lego website and a "right to hack" clause was added to end user license agreement of the Lego Mindstorms software. An official software developers kit for the RCX would later be released on the Mindstorms website. A number of products focusing on the RIS were released by adult hobbyists, including how-to books, and unofficial sensors and hardware. A convention for Lego Mindstorms hobbyists, named Mindfest, started in 1999. Despite strong sales, the Mindstorms development team was neglected by upper management. As a
cost-cutting measure, the Mindstorms office was shut down in 2001, and team members were laid-off or assigned to other projects. The Lego Group continued to produce the Robotics Invention System 2.0, selling around 40,000 units per year without advertising until the set was discontinued in 2006.{{cite web ==RCX==