This seems exactly like the sort of shenanigan that would piss off rather than appease the wood spirits.
Found this other experiment, part of the same series "Machines Responding to Superstitions".<p><a href="https://www.dezeen.com/2023/10/31/kinky-kashayam-portable-black-cat-radar/" rel="nofollow">https://www.dezeen.com/2023/10/31/kinky-kashayam-portable-bl...</a><p>Though it seems less like machine response than humans integrating technology into superstitious belief.
I'd only buy this if it included a subscription-based AI upsell to predict and adapt to my adjusting superstition needs over time
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!"<p>Looking for this in app form.
Knocking on wood was about knocking on <i>unpainted</i> wood, so that you have actual direct physical contact with wood. Remote knocking seems to go in the other direction...
> Knocking on wood was about knocking on unpainted wood, so that you have actual direct physical contact with wood.<p>How do you know this? For example, there is a wikipedia page section entitled "Origin of use in the English language"...<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knocking_on_wood#Origin_of_use_in_the_English_language" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knocking_on_wood#Origin_of_use...</a><p>but the contents of that section make it extremely clear that no relevant facts are known to wikipedia.
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)_/¯
If an app knocks on a tree and nobody is around…
Looking forward to one that will let me touch grass from my computer.
It's like FakeBlock from Arrested development
I am ratting this out to the Tree Beard
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.
Or just, you know, walk outside in the fresh air, find a nearby tree, and knock on it...