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▲Tree-mounted machines connect to web app to let users knock on wood remotely (designboom.com)
jtickle 12 hours ago [-]
This seems exactly like the sort of shenanigan that would piss off rather than appease the wood spirits.
weirdish 12 hours ago [-]
I'd only buy this if it included a subscription-based AI upsell to predict and adapt to my adjusting superstition needs over time
nkmnz 11 hours ago [-]
What’s next? Touch-grass-as-a-Service?
tdeck 5 hours ago [-]
There's already "After the Rapture Pet Care" which feels like a similar genre.

https://aftertherapturepetcare.com/

silveira 10 hours ago [-]
Blow a dandelion seed head and make a wish, but it’s a device blowing.
oriettaxx 7 hours ago [-]
as south European, I expect some volunteers for a planetary "touch balls"
stackghost 1 hours ago [-]
Touch *balls*?
cassepipe 6 hours ago [-]
drdaeman 18 minutes ago [-]
Said to be an actual thing (rather than a gag collectible): https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/oct/26/zero-energy-co...
bitwize 9 hours ago [-]
A service to automatically throw St. Joseph's Day bread into someone's backyard

The Rabbit AI of this space: a wearable over-the-shoulder salt thrower that connects to a cloud API

aaron695 4 hours ago [-]
[dead]
yetihehe 12 hours ago [-]
Knocking on wood was about knocking on unpainted wood, so that you have actual direct physical contact with wood. Remote knocking seems to go in the other direction...
thaumasiotes 11 hours ago [-]
> Knocking on wood was about knocking on unpainted wood, so that you have actual direct physical contact with wood.

How do you know this? For example, there is a wikipedia page section entitled "Origin of use in the English language"...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knocking_on_wood#Origin_of_use...

but the contents of that section make it extremely clear that no relevant facts are known to wikipedia.

7 hours ago [-]
pessimizer 7 hours ago [-]
The contents of the article make it clear that "touch wood" is basically synonymous with "knock on wood," making the knocking less important than the touching.

But is is important to mention that a ctrl-f on that page for "unpainted" is proof that you didn't spend much time looking.

couchand 9 hours ago [-]
N >= 2
gexla 2 hours ago [-]
I wonder if I could create a full time job for myself tossing salt over my shoulder.
krunck 12 hours ago [-]
There are societies where rather than knocking on wood one turns one's head and spits. For example: "Grandad is looking well after his fall, let's hope that doesn't happen again. Ptew!"

Looking for this in app form.

random_cat_8745 11 hours ago [-]
the true SaaS (Spit as a Service).
markdown 11 hours ago [-]
I'm imagining a thousand people in a spitshop in (Mechanical) Turkey in a sitting at desks with a spittoon, waiting for a signal to spit.
skinfaxi 12 hours ago [-]
Found this other experiment, part of the same series "Machines Responding to Superstitions".

https://www.dezeen.com/2023/10/31/kinky-kashayam-portable-bl...

Though it seems less like machine response than humans integrating technology into superstitious belief.

TehCorwiz 12 hours ago [-]
If an app knocks on a tree and nobody is around…
jagged-chisel 9 hours ago [-]
… go on
Isamu 5 hours ago [-]
Wait, is the tree in a VM?
merek 5 hours ago [-]
...does it still display ads?
psadri 7 hours ago [-]
Whoever created this - you are the crazy kind of person I want to meet in real life.
dr_pyser 5 hours ago [-]
I never had to knock on wood
gosen 11 hours ago [-]
I can't explain why but it's amazing! Maybe because in my culture "knocking on the wood 3 times" helps to avoid the bad luck and I lived with that for 20 years, or maybe it's just fun to imagine that you're knocking on the wood remotely ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
dvh 12 hours ago [-]
It's like FakeBlock from Arrested development
fancyswimtime 11 hours ago [-]
knock on cousin remotely
itissid 12 hours ago [-]
I am ratting this out to the Tree Beard
Cpoll 11 hours ago [-]
Looking forward to one that will let me touch grass from my computer.
ButlerianJihad 10 hours ago [-]
Nothing can surprise me. Every day at college, I would walk past these "Trees".

https://stuartcollection.ucsd.edu/artist/allen.html#about-th...

lofaszvanitt 11 hours ago [-]
You have to do it with a right hand, from under. So this is 100% fake.
classified 12 hours ago [-]
The knockers are missing solar panels to continuously charge their batteries. So there will be sustained costs to keep them running. And how water-proof are they? Apart from that, it's going to sell like hot cakes.
tinyplanets 12 hours ago [-]
Or just, you know, walk outside in the fresh air, find a nearby tree, and knock on it...
dimatter 12 hours ago [-]
r/whoosh
slipperybeluga 8 hours ago [-]
[dead]
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