The Finch Formerly Known As Gold

7 April 2007

Queen Victoria's keyboard (2)

Keyboard mods by SteampunkYou might remember this from February, when I said something to the effect that "committed typewriter fiend Andrea Harris might want one of her own after she sees this." Well, she's seen it, and she wants it. I wonder what she'd think of RSS feeds via telegraph sounder. (Me, I want this rotary-dial GSM cell phone, just to see how T-Mobile, which is desperate to sell me some high-zoot electrotoy with a camera, an MP3 player and a medical tricorder, would react to its presence.)

Update, 8 April: Tam likes it too.

Update, 9 April: Tam's readers seem to like it too; we've picked up 440 565 hits from View from the Porch at this writing. This is more than twice as much as I've ever gotten from that other person in Knox.

Posted at 11:36 AM to Entirely Too Cool


Heh, I want that portable rotary phone! Not interested in the RSS Feed thingie though, but that's because I hate RSS.

Posted by: Andrea Harris at 9:54 PM on 7 April 2007

That keyboard reminds me of the "computer terminals" in the movie Brazil.

Posted by: Francis W. Porretto at 5:24 AM on 8 April 2007

Mr. Porretto astutely points out the dead-tech look of the keyboard as some kind of prop from Brazil, by Terry Gilliam.

About the fifth time through, I finally realized that it was a thinly disguised horror film. Haven't looked at film the same way since.

Scary. That keyboard gives me the creeps.

Posted by: theirritablearchitect at 10:24 PM on 8 April 2007

Or the keyboards in Max Headroom....

Posted by: Jon C. at 11:23 PM on 8 April 2007

You'll be steam-punk blogging in no time.

Posted by: gail at 9:35 PM on 9 April 2007

Certainly this template seems to date to the dawn of the Industrial Age.

Posted by: CGHill at 9:59 PM on 9 April 2007

I'll take one of those keyboards, reminds me of my first typewriter, an IBM Model 04 electric from the late 40's on which I wrote my thesis. And also the rotary cell phone with no MP3, no camera, no texting, no IM, no internet, no games - no nothing but a phone. And make it from the same steel with a wrinkle-pattern finish. If Snap-On or Kennedy made a phone that'd be it.

Posted by: DirtCrashr at 10:16 AM on 11 April 2007