John Muir's Alarm Clock Desk | Hacker News Reader

John Muir's Alarm Clock Desk

atlasobscura.com

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The intricate mechanism for playful purposes reminds me of Japanese karakuri dolls [1]. Some videos are at [2, 3, 4].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karakuri_puppet

[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DgIDStgaybc

[3] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZDVB2GLdxzE&t=254s

[4] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Es9KzLwABm0

I love the meta-からくり, where the small doll "cranks" the larger one. Alan Kay eat your heart out!

Reminds me of this old video of a pneumatic contraption as an "alarm clock" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQ-l5PlDa-k

I wonder if Muir was the inspiration for Wallace and Gromit's ejector bed?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o0JIznO-RlI

Here's Donald Duck using a similar bed ( at 2:20):

https://youtu.be/RxPlY3a7dMU

What is that nauseating zooming/rolling of the frame? A lot of shots feel cropped, also. Evading Content ID?

I think I've seen a similar effect before. Would that be multiple discovery or is it a standard feature of some editor? The distortion also seems correlated to motion in the animation somehow—stabilization gone awry?

It looks like the kind of stabilization one should (or could) apply to shaky handheld video. That kind works by zooming in and using the borders for cropping and rotating. In this video it gets extra weird because somes scenes are meant to be shaky.

Sounds amazing from the description but I struggle to find a video showing it in action?

More practical, the famous magician J.E. Robert-Houdin invented a "lighter alarm clock" (réveil-briquet) in 1837 that sold pretty well and made him rich and allowed him to develop his "magical" tricks (many based upon electricity: he had an electric door bell and an automatic front porch in the 1860).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OvyvZHf6hZQ

...but who's John Muir?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0YInfr0hm4A

Everything I know about John Muir, I learned from Sam & Max. They didn't mention he invented this alarm clock though!

I miss the 1890s to 1990s when dudes with big beards used to actually do DIY shit

Like single bladed safety razors where you could shave yourself at home easily versus having to maintain straight razors or visit a barber?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_C._Gillette

But Muir's invention was meant for himself, while Gillette's razor was clearly not meant for himself. Or was he shaving his neck? So I see these as two different kinds of inventors. Randal Peltzer in Gremlins is more like Muir.

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