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Toy truck craps out domino runs

Cory Doctorow at 4:53 am Fri, Nov 20, 2009

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Brando's Auto Domino Building Truck is a battery-powered toy truck that shits bricks -- that is, it poops out dominos standing on end at the correct intervals to make a domino run. Or so the manufacturer says -- I haven't tried it yet. But I have a vision of setting this thing down at one end of an airport concourse and creating a mile-long run. I love that the dominos load in via a magazine that sticks out of the top like a banana-clip on an automatic rifle.

The Auto Domino Building Truck (via Red Ferret)

I write books. My latest is a YA science fiction novel called Homeland (it's the sequel to Little Brother). More books: Rapture of the Nerds (a novel, with Charlie Stross); With a Little Help (short stories); and The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (novella and nonfic). I speak all over the place and I tweet and tumble, too.

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  • johnnyaction

    I love it.

    I bet I could graft a pinata onto it so it was festive and crapped a rainbow. Of course it would have to be a unicorn: http://www.amazon.com/Aztec-Imports-PF107-Unicorn-Pinata/dp/B0013WF6LC

  • Anonymous

    Now you’ve gone and done it. You’ve put the phrases “airp*rt c*nc*urse” and “aut*matic r1fle” in the same paragraph with the Domino Building Truck. Good luck ever taking this toy on an airpl^ne.

  • Tedsville

    This is extremely awesome. Im gonna get one and make my own mag that’l store loads and lodas of dominoes, probs in drum form, and send it on a quest to build some kind of epic domino run.

  • holtt

    Brilliant! Very BB, very thank you :)

  • Steiny

    Obligatory Motivator:

    http://i48.tinypic.com/16gzk02.jpg

  • Anonymous

    I have one of these, not specifically this one from this company. But these have been around for YEARS in various incarnations and colour combinations.

  • angrydroid

    Cool!

  • candycritic

    The disappointing part of the truck is the small size of the clips. What you have to do is design a super clip for it and send it across the country.

  • Anonymous

    There was a toy from the early 90′s that did this as well, but it could only do straight lines. The great thing about that one was that its casing was transparent, so you could see how it worked

    Video:
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7CFu6AEaTaI

  • Bender

    As a child, I was disappointed so many times by automated toys that rarely lived up to their commercials. Looks neat, but I want to see this in action in the real world.

  • Zan

    This isn’t anything new. I had a Domino Rally set from Pressman Toys in the early 90s that included their “pathmaker” which was a slightly more compact version of this. I don’t think they make them any more, but it worked very well. There is a YouTube video of it at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6kACPHoVx6U with bonus cat watching footage.

  • wikr1

    Fun, but can it do this: http://dominodomain.com/page/533?album_id=135&picture_id=2160

    • netsharc

      Ugh, Domino Day sucks. Or at least their need to keep breaking their own records and their awful TV presentation sucks. The first problem makes them just make giant fields of thousand x thousand dominoes that fall down to reveal some sort of picture, neat, but for dominoes quite uncreative. The second makes them do stupid delay techniques like a slowly rotating ball on a tether that will only hit the next domino… right after these messages!

  • AirPillo

    I remember a very similar toy from the late 90′s that was an accessory for use with “Domino Rally” dominoes sets. I think it was called the “domino dealer”.

  • kathryn

    Yeah, nothing new. I had one as a kid, maybe 15 years ago. The truck worked ok, but I remember that the “dominos” that came with it were super cheap and lightweight, and tipped over too easily to get anything particularly elaborate built. Or maybe I was just a clumsy kid, who knows.

  • Steve

    Great headline Cory! Made me smile on a Fri morning. :)

  • Anonymous

    It’s not a banana clip because the magazine is straight. The term banana clip refers to a curved magazine.

  • cryptique

    I ordered one. Always on the lookout for gifts for my niece, especially if they might drive my brother crazy.

    Looks like it ships from Hong Kong, so if anyone’s planning to order one for Christmas, do it now. They accept PayPal, which is nice.

  • Anonymous

    Heh heh heh. . . he said “CRAPS out domino RUNS”

    heh heh heh . . .

  • Anonymous

    Let the clip/magazine pedantry begin!

  • deixamli

    I remember therapeutically setting up dominoes as a kid, and the sense of accomplishment I had when I made it through my entire set! Yet another device to make our kids lazy? :)

    • Anonymous

      Agreed! Im told I was a bit impatient when I was younger. Setting up dominoes was good therapy – and a lot of fun. The effort I put into it equalled the satisfaction I got when I knocked them all over. This truck may seem clever to someone who never spent hours and hours devoted to a setup that would fall over in a just a minute.