Joseph Herscher | ||||||||||
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Personal information | ||||||||||
Born | ||||||||||
Occupations | YouTuber Artist | |||||||||
Website | josephsmachines.com | |||||||||
YouTube information | ||||||||||
Channel | ||||||||||
Years active | 2008–present | |||||||||
Genre | Comical Chain-Reaction Machines | |||||||||
Subscribers | 3.34 million [1] | |||||||||
Total views | 1.83 billion [1] | |||||||||
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Last updated: 12 April 2023 |
Joseph Herscher is a YouTube personality known for his channel Joseph's Machines. Herscher is a kinetic artist who specializes in making comical chain-reaction machines. [2] He made his first machine, the Lolly Machine, when he was five. [3]
He was a 2013 Artist-in-Residence at the McColl Center for Art + Innovation in Charlotte, North Carolina. [4]
Joseph was born in New York City, grew up in Auckland, New Zealand, and then moved back to New York City where he continued to create his eccentric machines. [5] [6] [7] He is also a public speaker. Joseph created and starred in the 2015 comedy web series Jiwi's Machines. In July 2019, he launched a new web series, What's Your Problem?, co-created with Gemma Gracewood and made by Augusto Entertainment. [8] As of June 2021 [update] , Herscher was living in London. [9]
Many of Herscher's devices are referred to as Rube Goldberg machines. [10] [11] [12] [13]
Reuben Garrett Lucius Goldberg, better known as Rube Goldberg, was an American cartoonist, sculptor, author, engineer, and inventor.
A Rube Goldberg machine, named after American cartoonist Rube Goldberg, is a chain reaction–type machine or contraption intentionally designed to perform a simple task in an indirect and (impractically) overly complicated way. Usually, these machines consist of a series of simple unrelated devices; the action of each triggers the initiation of the next, eventually resulting in achieving a stated goal.
The Incredible Machine (TIM) is a series of video games in which players create a series of Rube Goldberg devices. They were originally designed and coded by Kevin Ryan and produced by Jeff Tunnell, the now-defunct Jeff Tunnell Productions, and published by Dynamix; the 1993 through 1995 versions had the same development team, but the later 2000–2001 games have different designers. All versions were published by Sierra Entertainment. The entire series and intellectual property were acquired by Jeff Tunnell-founded PushButton Labs in October 2009. PushButton Labs was later acquired by Playdom, itself a division of Disney Interactive, so as of now the rights are held by The Walt Disney Company.
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In it Herscher plays Jiwi (for Jewish Kiwi), an inventor who lives with his sister June (Olivia Tennet) in an inherited house, creating gentle mayhem with his fantastical machines.