The Complicated Way to Turn on a Flashlight

jangobongo writes "A machine built by the Purdue Society of Professional Engineers employed an outer-space theme and used steps that incorporated a bouncing water balloon, a fireman action figure fleeing a fire and weights attached to a spinning bicycle wheel to win the 18th national Purdue Rube Goldberg Machine Contest. The winning machine told the story of rocket being launched. As the rocket traveled into space, a meteor hit Earth and started a fire. While the mock fire was put out, the rocket turned on the flashlight to shine back down on Earth. A short video clip can be seen here. The contest was filmed by the Game Show Network to be featured on the network's show, 'Games Across America,' at some future date."

Comments

I read about this on CNN on Saturday

[Anonymous Coward]

I guess CNN is now the place to go for breaking geek news.

I have a rue goldberg where...

[deft]

you post a 1.2 meg video on the front of slashdot which activates 50,000 people with fast connections to right click and download, thus setting a server on fire...

but do I get filmed? nooo....

.... A short video clip can be seen here.

[macaulay805]

A short video clip can be seen here.

Not anymore.

Re:.... A short video clip can be seen here.

[Hogwash McFly]

The sequence is as follows:

• Video file posted on Slashdot
  
• Server whimpers like a schoolgirl as it catches on fire
  
• Fire burns through a string which was suspending a weight
  
• Weight falls onto a see-saw which switches on a table lamp
  
• Light from lamp activates a light sensor, switching on a DVD player
  
• DVD plays, showing a pimply engineering student repeating the words 'Fuck you Slashdot' over and over.

Re:mirrors, including .mov

[CdBee]

"I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey (Parent's Sig

That poor server would probably rather be either, right now.

Complicated Way

[blatantdog]

So civilians figured out what the US Military does everyday.

*ducks*

[cmacmanus]

You haven't heard the one about how many Purdue Society of Professional Engineers does it take to turn on a flashlight? :P

I can see it now...

[IBeatUpNerds]

Snippet from one of their resumes:

Part of team that won award three years running for devising the most complex and inefficient machine possible.

Oh yeah... HR departments will jump these guys.

Maybe..

[Anonymous Coward]

The webserver is hosted on the flashlight..

Yes!

[Krankheit]

This will be great for me! Where can I order? I will never have to worry about people using my flashlight batteries up again, as long as I don't keep the operation manual nearby. This is similar to the solution I put in place with my laptop. Students used to come in and drain my laptop's battery when it ran Windows. Now my laptop runs Linux. When tehy try to use my laptop, they tell me my laptop crashed. I wonder if those who attempt to use this new light emitting will think it is broken or something...

A walk down memory lane...

[Anonymous Coward]

It would be difficult to describe all 125 steps, but the items included billiard balls, a boxing glove, a space cowboy, a satellite, a vacuum cleaner and a spaghetti fork.

From volume 2 of the Kama Sutra, I presume.

I see

[Bootle]

The Purdue society of professional engineers won the Purdue contest...

That's almost as bad as having a Vice President's oilcompany winning US oil contracts in Iraq... Oh wait!

Re:Jesus Christ People

[winkydink]

Thank you for your feedback.

Re:you know what I love?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not surprised your friend didn't get the external ringer/bell attachment; that thing hurts when it goes off in your pocket.

"rocket being launched"

[MisterLawyer]

"The winning machine told the story of rocket being launched."

In case you haven't heard of him, he's the great grandson of dances with wolves.

I saw better on Tom and Jerry

[LoverOfJoy]

Tom had much more complicated techniques.

Redundant

[Datamonstar]

Shouldn't this whole article be modded -100000 redundant?

Rubes

[Monkey Angst]

No description of a good Rube Goldberg device is complete without the phrase "...which scares the chicken, who lays an egg, which rolls down a tube..."

Mine is better

[clambake]

My rube goldberg machine involves the evolution of Gerbles until the point that they are capable of building thier own flashlights and turning them on. I hope there isn't a time limit.