This innocent typewriter was modded to act as a keyboard and typewriter. The idea is to remove the computer interface from the process, giving a user the ability to interact via email but avoid computer frustrations. (The idea came from the creators mothers frustration with computers) Thanks to [BBCmicro] for sending it it.
So they invented a cordless teletype :-)
Posted at 2:36 pm on Jul 25th, 2007 by TJ
Neat idea but like a previous poster noted, hows it work? I’m also curious how a person is supposed to READ email.
Posted at 5:22 pm on Jul 25th, 2007 by jweller
It would have been infinitely easier if they used an IBM Selectric typewriter. It already has a rs232 port on the back for usage as a teletype. All you would have to do is write the software.
Posted at 5:52 pm on Jul 25th, 2007 by Garret Noble
jweller: i was wondering the same thing.
It would be much more useful if the same “type-writer” could also “print-out” received emails.
Posted at 5:58 pm on Jul 25th, 2007 by alkhaarj
This is why I love this site! So many cool and interesting ideas!
Posted at 7:55 pm on Jul 25th, 2007 by Greg Poole
my mom uses something similar. she has a typewriter and a service called celery. which turns her typed page into an email. http://www.mycelery.com. she can receive messages too.
Posted at 9:02 am on Jul 26th, 2007 by kyle_s
grow up you lot its a load of twaddel
Posted at 6:45 pm on Jul 26th, 2007 by steve
Strange, but impressive. I too would like to see some more details on the conversion. For example, how does it detect the application of liquid paper?
Posted at 3:29 am on Jul 27th, 2007 by Darkcobra
that is such a great Idea. . Just think of all the grandparents that would be willing to send email with that. . .
Posted at 1:37 pm on Jul 27th, 2007 by Rodney Waggoner
I just do not understand those who can not adapt to using e mail. I know the governor of New Mexico does not even have a public e mail address and spends mega tax dollars on receiving/sorting through snail mail. Nifty teletype mod though.
Posted at 5:20 pm on Jul 27th, 2007 by Neagle
Too bad many of these mods are undocumented (how to build, sources, etc.) and it’s even useless for the person it was designed for, since she can’t read the answers, only send e-mails. And as it was noted on the site, she can’t use the scrollbar, so can’t read e-mails on computers either. Of course easier (without interesting hardware hack) would be for her a software package, which scans automatically the typed paper with a scanner, can OCR it, and send the e-mail automatically, and in reverse, print the incoming e-mails with some printer (of course heavy spamfilter would be needed).
I would be more interested in some inverse hacks (is there any?), to mod an electric typewriter to be a fast, simple (and cheap to refill) matrix printer. Probably the electronics and the custom driver wouldn’t be an extremely big challenge, paper feed would be.
the answer is simple. why buy a special machine to transform it into an email just type it up on the type roghter and scan it enless you dont have a scanner then your stuffed!
Posted at 10:51 pm on Sep 11th, 2007 by Michael
lol;ring ring get my type witer!
Posted at 5:33 pm on Sep 24th, 2007 by hackamy
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This is such a lovely project, totally useless to me, but nice nonetheless. I can’t help but wish for more detail about the project though, as whats provided is pretty shallow. What if my mother wants one?
Posted at 1:49 pm on Jul 25th, 2007 by Hellahulla