The Grumpy Owl: Channel 666

Oh television. I don't like what you do to me and I don't know what you are. I see you as a guest in my house but what a bad guest . . . Always shouting, trying to sell me things and carrying on like a crackhead. "Buy this toaster. Buy this car! Buy this soda. You're a loser if you don't BUY BUY BUY!!"

And I'm not much of a host. I sit in front of you, shouting right back, calling you names, saying I want to throw you through the window.

So you show me some corpses. Every night at six then again at eleven. Is that a threat?

I have to be honest with you, Television. You scare me. A lot.

But I love those flickering lights. I'd watch those even if nothing was on. And now I can.

The people at UP TO YOU have finally done something to stop your pollution of my head. I can now have my cake and it too. "The Groovetube is simply a translucent plastic box that suction cups to the screen of your television. It has a grid of dividers inside it that diffuses the colors from your television producing an amazing, colorful abstraction of anything you watch."

I look forward to many long hours of watching you now. If this doesn't bring the romance back, I really don't know what will.

Labels: products, television

posted by Ryan Oakley @ 3:25 PM

12 Comments:

At 5:30 PM, josh at badempire dot com said…

I have one of these and love it! I actually put it on my 14 inch iBook screen and turn on my elcetricsheep screensave and the magic that happens is beyond words.

They are also created by one of the best DJ's in the northwest. Matt Greise.

http://groovetube.tv
At 5:37 PM, Anonymous said…

Excellent. Now my we can pixellate ourselves during live sex.
At 6:33 PM, Anonymous said…

You can make your own with toilet paper tubes and wax paper. You just need to plug the gaps between the tubes with tissue paper.
At 6:38 PM, Neil said…

Looks very cool. This would be great to have going in the background during a party.
At 7:26 PM, Fred said…

Excellent, I wanna share this idea ;)
At 7:58 PM, zara said…

I used to make these with my friends years ago. Perhaps not as fancy, but save up some toilet paper rolls, stack them and place thick vellum on each side -- et voila! You have a home-made groovetube!
At 11:58 AM, Anonymous said…

However, their page is not a good surfing experience. Flash AND Quicktime, yuck!

Not your fault, I know ;-)
At 1:48 PM, Anonymous said…

We've had these in the store I work at (architecture & design specialty)for more than a year and we cannot give the darn things away. Nobody understands what they are even when we explain how they work.
At 7:56 PM, The Pathetic Earthling said…

I saw a guy do this once with an array of toilet paper tubes and a layer of tissue paper. The resolution was obviously slightly higher (say 14 x 10 pixels), but a similar effect. With the circles in a hex array, it had a slightly The-View-From-The-Bug-Eyed-Atomic-Monster look, and less disco, but quite cool.
At 10:30 PM, Ryan Oakley said…

Anon
You want to see a bad web page you've gotta see Tyra's new page - It's a fucking nightmare.

http://www.tyrabanks.com/
At 12:34 PM, Anonymous said…

Oh the ironing, of advertising this thing on your blog. ;)

Lisa: Bart, the word is irony.

Bart: Huh?
At 12:04 PM, axis0girl said…

Hey there - to the person who has the groovetubes in their art/design store and can't give them away, do you have a small one? i'll take it in a heart beat if so. these are very hard to find. axis0girl@gmail.com. thank you!