WASHINGTON (AP) — If President Barack Obama is mingling with inventors, sooner or later there has to be a robot. On Wednesday, it was Russell, the 17-foot electric giraffe towering in the South Lawn of the White House, a symbol of the quirky and clever creations Obama wanted to showcase on a day devoted to innovation.

“New tools and technologies are making the building of things easier than ever,” Obama told entrepreneurs and students who gathered at the White House at its first Maker Faire. “There is a democratization of manufacturing that is potentially available because of technology.”