Joseph of Joseph’s Machines Shares How He Creates His Wonderfully Complex Rube Goldberg Contraptions

Over the years, we’ve posted a number of the wonderfully complex and humorous Rube Goldberg machines created by inventor Joseph Herscher of Joseph’s Machines, with the next one
being a hilarious Lunch Feeder. Herscher sat down with the Wired series Obessed to talk about how and why he makes these playful, “life simplifying” contraptions.

Machines are usually designed to be as efficient as possible and to then go and make a machine that’s super inefficient and playful. there’s something sort of delightful and absurd about it. …I hate always trying to get the last bit of ketchup out of a bottle, you know when the sauce gets stuck at the bottom of the bottle. Annoying right? So that motivates me like there’s got to be a better way. … it’s a time-consuming process.

Lori Dorn
Lori Dorn

Lori is a Laughing Squid Contributing Editor based in New York City who has been writing blog posts for over a decade. She also enjoys making jewelry, playing guitar, taking photos and mixing craft cocktails.