@tweet_tree: Twitter controlled Christmas tree

@tweet_tree is a Christmas tree that everyone can control from Twitter. Just tweet a color to @tweet_tree. A small embedded server reads your tweets, and fades our fiber optic tree to the colors you send. New tweets are grabbed every few seconds.

Live streaming video of @tweet_tree is on USTREAM (The broadcast has ended, thanks to everyone who gave us a light show with Twitter!). See this article with the original formatting at DangerousPrototypes.com

@tweet_tree is a stand-alone network appliance based on our open source, business card size web platform. The web platform is available as a kit for $35, including worldwide shipping. Seeed Studio can assemble yours for $5 more.

Using it

To choose the color of our tree, just send a color to @tweet_tree on Twitter.

@tweet_tree red, green, purple, green, p, g, r, b

@tweet_tree understands red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple. Send one color, or combination of colors to morph through. Separate multiple colors with a comma. Only the first letter of the color matters, r,o,y,g,b, & p, are acceptable color commands.

@tweet_tree red, *ff0000, green, *00ff00, blue, *0000ff

You can also blend custom colors using 24bit hexadecimal color codes. Here's a color picking tool to help you choose values. Send the value as *rrggbb, where rr=red, gg=green, and bb=blue. We used the * designator because the more common # is already used for Twitter hash tags.

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Step 1: Overview

Tweet a color to @tweet_tree on Twitter. A business card size server connects to Twitter once every few seconds and grabs new tweets. A multicolor LED in our fiber optic Christmas tree fades to the new color.

If there's are more than one color in a tweet, or multiple tweets, the tree fades between them until it reaches the most recently sent tweet.