More Rube Goldberg Fun

Boing Boing has an article about two grad students from Pratt spending 30 hours to build a device that takes your photo in 30 seconds. How long, do you think, before this idea will be stolen for a commercial? See my recent post. What fascinates us about doing very simple things in a complicated way?

And who was Rube Goldberg anyway? Well, I'm glad you asked. I went to the Internet for the answer.

Rube Goldberg was born in San Francisco on July 4, 1883. He was a cartoonist, and a founding member and the first president of the National Cartoonists Society. In fact, the Cartoonist of the Year is awarded the Rueben Award, in Rube's honor. Rube Goldberg was also a sculptor, author, engineer and inventor. The so-called Rube Goldberg Machine has a UK counterpart, Heath Robinson. Both used illustrations to outline incredibly complex devices to complete very simple tasks.

Goldberg's devices have been immortalized in cartoons and in the "Final Destination" movie series, the "Mousetrap" game of my youth (showing my age, here) and in "Rube Goldberg" contests held internationally. The biggest one in the US appears to be held at Purdue University in West Lafayette, IN. This year's theme was "Water a Plant" and the winner is a team from Wisconsin with this amazing entry, showing the history of the world from the Big Bang through now, culminating with the watering of a plant.

You can scratch that Goldberg itch by subscribing to the youtube channel.