The name BEAM was coined by Mark Tilden(the "father" of BEAM)and stands for:
Biology
Electronics
Aestethics
Mechanics
Biology:many of the BEAM bots look like,and sometimes move like,insects.
Electronics:pretty obvious this,without an electronic circuit the bots wouldn't do much.
Aestethics:As important as the electronics part,the bots also have to look good.
Mechanics:In many bots this is a crucial part to get it to function properly.
The electronic circuits used in BEAM robots are generally simple,some only use 3 or 4 components.
Many of the robots are powered by solar cells,some use batteries and others use a combination of those two.
An important part of building BEAM robots is the use of techno-scrap or junk,or in other words:
salvaging useful parts from electronic devices,be it components or other parts.
BEAM robots come in different types for example:
Sitters,like pummers and ornaments.
Rollers,like solarollers and symets.
Crawlers,like turbots.
Squirmers,like magbots,vibrobots and headbots.
My views and take on BEAM bots
I've been building BEAM bots for a little over a year now,before that I had no experience in electronics whatsoever.
In that year I've learned a lot especially from the people at the BEAM group on Yahoo.I'm glad to say my
soldering skills have improved much.
The thing I like most about building BEAM robots is the simplicity(usually)of the circuits so that I can focus on 
the design of the robot.
The A in BEAM that is.As much as I like soldering circuits and the satisfaction when it works,the look of the robot is where I find most joy.
That is also the reason why I haven't build any of the more complex robots like walkers yet.
Basically I build pummers,solarollers,symets and magbots.I feel that sometimes you come across the same kind of robots 
too often.More creativity is what I would like to see.
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