The Clapper: Yes, that one. 

Relays make big clicky sound, that's maybe why they used triacs. To prevent the clapper to systematically trigger itself.

I’ve been pestering Alec to make a video about this for ages! So happy to see it!

We have a Bob Ross themed clapper that we use to control Xmas lights. It turns stuff on, turns on a night light, and says Bobby Ross’s catch phrases depending on how many claps. It is definitely finicky but it’s a holiday tradition at our house. It is especially hilarious because the popping of a wood fire sets it off all the time, and we do a lot of heating with wood, so the thing will just spontaneously turn on the tree and talk about happy accidents. It’s like we are hosting the ghost of Bob Ross for a couple months a year.

I'll never forget the Clapper! My grandma's Yorkshire terrier would sit and bark at it, turning it on and off, for hours at a time. He was a wizard!

the box falling over and literally resetting you in your mental script was comedy gold, literally laughed out loud.

"Discerning what isn't a clap" is the most top tier B-roll I've ever seen.

My parents got a clapper in the early 90's to control the Christmas tree, every time the dog barked it would trigger the clapper. It was mildly entertaining.

When my grandmother got arthritis in her hands, we got her a dog click trainer so she could still use her clapper. Worked quite well!

A healthy round of applause on a variety or game show could cause it to trigger too, especially at the volume my grandad used to watch tv at. It was even funnier when the clapper commercial would come on and turn his lights on and off 😂

For a company with 4 products, they've got a high level of nostalgia.

The funny thing about the "Ove Glove" is that it is literally identical to the knit "mill gloves" used in all sorts of industrial processes where one might need to move hot parts around. I'm willing to bet that idea came from someone just taking their gloves home from work to use as oven mits, and having a eureka moment when they realized they could sell them directly to consumers who *didn't* work around rubber molds or whatever.

I’ve been using a clapper for my bedroom lights for years and I personally love it. Occasionally turns on during certain…bedroom activities, but people always think it’s hilarious. And really convenient for my room layout which forces me to have my light on the opposite side of the room from the bed.

I was 2nd tier tech support at Compaq back in the early 90's back when tech support was open 24/7 and free (and we would help with ANYTHING) and I prank called one of the new guys, making him try to help the issue I was having: I was playing "DOOM" (it had just been released) and every time I fired the pistol twice, The Clapper would activate and turn off my computer.

A while back I bought the clapper to turn on a couple of lights aimed at my dartboard. I figured out really quick that the sound of a dart hitting the dartboard and then the echo made in my garage triggered it to switch my lights on and off. So, it became part of the game... Throw one dart in light, then the next in the dark, and the 3rd in the light again

TC: “no effort November” Also TC: *”no effort” content still more consistent and of higher quality than 99.9% of YT*

Alec's writing is underrated. Even bs'ing around with minimal effort, the talent spreads like oobleck and gets into everything.

We bought a Bob Ross talking clapper last year and returned it after a week. The clapper part worked but Bob would randomly talk without a clap. It was like the room was haunted by Bob Ross.

Your "not clapping" noises absolutely sent me. Good video, as always.

The triple clap followed by "ooh, a different thing!" got me good 😅

Wow, when you talked about TV's being used with it, I thought "that's a really cool idea, so you can turn your TV on with just a few claps". And then I remembered the remotes exist, and I can't honestly tell you the last time I pushed a button on my TV itself.

Alec: I've recorded and repurposed your "non-clappy" noises into a series of alerts for my various devices.

My clapper story: bought one once at a yard sale. A while later, my mom and I were having a heated argument, and the shouting quickly turned to giggles because the light would toggle on and off every couple of words. Needless to say, that argument didn't last long.

We used to have The Clapper! My stepdad had COPD, so he coughed all the time. The Clapper flicked the light on & off so much, it made our living room look like a rave.

Agreed, the "Ove" Glove is brilliant. The rare steam-resistant version even more so!

I always wanted to put a bunch of Clappers in an auditorium and see if hilarity ensued.

I had a clapper as a teen and found that it was shockingly effective when put on the higher-threshold sensitivity, and then not clapping, but clicking my tongue. Something about the sound of clicking your tongue is very identifiable to its circuitry as a "clap" even at volumes low enough not to wake other people up, and doesn't make your hands sore.

The Clapper first came out when I was a kid, and in our house we wondered why it was seen as some kind of new idea. That's because we had a Whistle Switch; same concept, except it responded to the sound of the included "whistle" (basically an old-school squeaky toy), so it was very unlikely you'd ever get a false activation. I kind of miss that thing.

Sometime in the late 70s or 80s I had gotten a “Whistle Switch“ from RadioShack (I think it was). It had a fairly large switching box that plugged into the wall, that included a switched outlet, plus a plastic squeeze bulb that included a high-pitched whistle. So to turn on and off your lights, you would squeeze the squeeze bulb thingy to produce a high-pitched whistle, and it would switch your light on or off. I loved it! My love for it became stronger when I discovered that if I turned it to a lower discrimination setting, I could hiss loudly at it (with extra energy & focus on including high frequencies in my hiss) and and it would switch the switch! So I gave up the plastic squeeze whistle and controlled it with hisses. I loved that I didn’t need a remote. It was funny that none of my friends could manage to hiss at it just right - I suspected their hisses were too low energy, and included to few high frequencies. I was so sad when it died. 😿

I loved the chia pet catch phrase altered to “sa-sa-sa-selling” so casually inserted like it was nothing 😂

Now I'm wondering, if you had your TV plugged in to your Clapper, and the Clapper's commercial came on, would the claps in the commercial turn off your TV?

I had the original Clapper. And yeah, it was super sensitive. The first "wireless" remote was just a handheld mechanical clicker that just made a loud click when you depressed the button. There were a bunch of items in the 70's that responded to clicks. The coolest click activated thing I had was a remote control tank. The controller was just a clicker (like the Clapper clicker) that made a loud click and when the tank heard it, it would turn in one direction and if you clicked it again, it would turn in the other direction. Ahhhh the good 'ol days of technology 😂.

“Oooh, a different thing!” made me choke. We must protect this man at all costs.

Your "no effort" is still way better than a lot of other's people "I really tried.". Great video.

I made my own version of a clapper as a kid using a noise-sensitive plasma globe next to a touch-sensitive lamp. It was weird but it worked well.

Having the brains on a daughterboard makes a ton of sense to me. You could change the logic components without changing the rest of the design, and we definitely knew the gist of Moore's Law at the time. It seems a clever bit of future proofing.

Even your "Low Effort" videos are captivating and entertaining. Please keep it up. Thanks for all the great videos!

My girlfriend in high school bought me one of these for Christmas and it was unironically one of the best gifts someone's ever given me. I still have it and use it almost 15 years later

Reminds me of my grandparents' house. My grandfather's disability made it hard to operate light switches. So there were numerous Clappers that he could activate with his voice or tapping his cane on the floor. One very smart dog we had found that if she was not getting all the attention she wanted, two sharp barks could shift all the attention to her.

You’re breaking into a house to steal as many valuables as you can. It’s late at night and here’s no cars in the driveway, you think maybe they’re out of town. You jiggle the handle on the back door, and to your surprise, it’s unlocked. You sneak into the living room illuminated by a single lamp in the corner of the room. You look around the room and think “damn, I just hit the jackpot!” The silence is broken by two sharp claps,you freeze, the lights go dark, you realize you’ve made a mistake. You hear two more claps, but much louder this time. The lights come back on and as your eyes dart to the burning agony in your abdomen, you see blood. Lots of it. You begin to panic and look for a place to hide, you drop to your knees and crawl as fast as you can to the space between the couch and the wall, your knees and feet slipping and sliding on all the blood with each move. You hear two more claps. Normal claps this time, the room goes completely dark. You freeze again, reflexively, listening for any clue as to what you’re up against. In the moment of silence you can hear your heart pumping more and more of your precious blood all over the wood floors. A deep, booming voice breaks the silence. “You picked the wrong damn house” you hear footsteps coming towards you, there’s nothing you can do but cower. You’re completely defenseless. The footsteps stop, he’s standing right in front of you, two claps, the lights come on. You take in the man standing over you and realize that it’s the founder of Joseph Enterprises, Joseph Pedott. He stands over you as if he’s admiring his work, a gold plated semi auto pistol is in his hand, by his side, he looks you up and down with a proud smirk on his face. Your eyes dart right and left searching for something to defend yourself, but there’s nothing. He raises the gun, level with your face and says “Clap On, Clap Off” then he shoots and you’re dead. -The End

In Australia it’s quite common for, say, lamps, flood lights or non-hardwired garage lights, etc, not to have a switch on either the cable or the device. That is why the outlet has a switch. It also means you avoid any arcing when plugging in irons or any other 2000w + devices into outlet.

6:25 This extra bit of animation for the arrows and text are the antithesis of "no effort" and, as always, I am totally here for it.

The noises you were making while testing the microphones capability was absolutely hilarious!

I will take your recommendation for The Sequel To Oven Mitts into consideration. Like most savvy consumers, I've always just assumed out of hand that everything sold in an infomercial is either obviously useless kitsch or just straight-up incapable of actually doing what it says on the box for one reason or another. But then, I suppose anything that claimed to protect your hands from getting burned would damn well _have_ to work as advertised if they didn't want to get sued into the Middle Ages, so if they're still in business that's a good sign.

I figured your shirt was an artistic nod to the percolator’s place in the lore of the channel but a light bulb (clap clap) went off around the 10 minute mark when I realized “there was a fish IN the percolator”.

Bro is incapable of making an electrical episode without sassing the switched outlets lol

The Ove Glove is unironically a good product, especially if you use grills. Okay, we've been using knock-off gloves for a while now, but that was the first pick-up.

I'm so glad you mentioned the Ove' Glove! It's one of my all-time favorite kitchen tools, now verified by Technology Connections!

Oh damn, I forgot to turn on subtitles. Got to watch it again now ^.^ You're so right about the new Patreon logo.

I don't know if anyone has ever pointed this out before but you have really nailed the PBS aesthetic in your videos. You're like the Mr. Rogers of tech.

I had a clapper in my bedroom for my entire childhood! The trick I used was tapping the wall that it was plugged into with my knuckles, you didn't have to be nearly as loud as clapping.

Man I love your show. Every time I have a " Hey waitaminnit but whatabout...!" moment it's usually right before you cover it. I'd definitely let my friends kids watch your channel!

Just found this channel and I love it! The bloopers are a hilarious extra as well lol.

I built a clapper in high school electronics class. A few years later I connected it to a TV in my bathroom, it was super handy.... except after Taco Tuesday, that made a few false triggers! It was nicknamed the "Crapper Clapper"

I really like the "no effort November" series. More frequent, but shorter, uploads open the floodgates to a whole buttload of things that you simply can't wrangle into one of your signature 45 minute show-and-tells. Which is a shame, because there are a whole host of doodads that fandangle in interesting ways that will only take 10-15 minutes to explain, skits, dad jokes and snarks included. And I'm here for all of them.

I love the idea of a horror where the murder is chasing the victim, but the whole house has clapper lights and they're running around clapping the lights on and off

What a blessing this channel is, found randomly a few days ago and now its become my go-to when im winding down from a migraine. The only channel I can watch, its just so relaxing and without crazy flashes or volume, thank you

My grandparents had a clapper for a tv in their bedroom, yeah they were those type that could and did sleep with a tv making all kinds of sound and light. When I lived with them my bedroom was right next to theirs. I had to go to their room several times to tap the clapper to turn their tv off all the while they both were snoring hard asleep. thanks for bringing back those memories. looking back i miss those days

At least when you asked the clapper to turn off the lights you didn't get an AI voice asking you if you are also interested in trying out a new routine to help ensure you always have fresh underwear to put on when the lights come back on.

I remember the clapper commercials and the thing they had going at the time was you did not have other remote control options. Maybe in a test lab some place but not the average consumer. The 'remote' on our first VCR was a controller with a 15 foot cable so you could still on your sofa. It was not a true remote like we think of now. So ANY remote control seemed novel at the time.

"Goes against the jingle which is devastating " 😂 you kill me

As physical barriers become less and less visible over the internet and the world becomes more and more english speaking - this channel and Alec is simply the absolute most useful, educational and informative combination on the web for non-americans, for completely free! I have never heard of or seen this device in action any more than dubbed old sitcom references. I love it! Thank you so much- I am so intrigued and feel like I just got a 7 day early birthday present! 😍❤️🙏

Speaking of X10, I had LOTS of X10 stuff in a previous house. Ganky and janky but worked.. mostly. I think an episode on X10 would be informative to lots of people... smart home before smart home was a thing.

I'm here for the wall-socket fight on the side of being able to isolate the zap-zap from my iron that has no switch.

I'm so glad I discovered your channel. Cheers to another great video, amigo 🍻

What a classic. My parents had one of these back in the 70's I think. I was young enough to think it was totally magic. Of course, as said, with many kids in the house, it turned into a disco light machine pretty often. 🙂 For couples without kids, I wonder how many times it would produce a strobe effect from vigorous, repeated slapping sounds NOT made with the hands.

So many of us Gen Xers have this commercial jingle burned into our memories... I can recall specifically when they added the new "three clap" feature.

The clapper is a device that, if it fits in your routine, is a marvel. We used to use ours constantly at an old apartment. But now in our home it just didn't fit into our lives in an effective way. I tried using it for some decor around the kitchen but man.. Any plate or glass that clicks would set it off haha. I'll find a use for it some day. Probably a work shed.

I love your editing. Cracked up every time I heard “the clapper” sound overlaying whenever you said the clapper

Honestly, it’s waaaaaaay more practical than connecting your lights to a smart plug that you can only operate if you can find your cell phone.

Hey! You said "no effort!" That text with the triac looked very much like effort to me! And that new logo switch at the end! :D

The switches on Australian electrical outlets are really useful in stopping small children from sticking their fingers in them and getting a shock, and it's also great if you have a device you don't want to keep unplugging from the wall (ie an expensive and fragile lamp with a 30yr old fraying powercord)

You’re so great. Enjoyed you for years 😊

The clapper "ringing a bell" is an extremely underrated pun.

My mom knows a blind guy who had one of these hooked up to his phone, which would sound from speakers throughout the apartment (small apartment, allowing one or two small mics to pick up speech). Whenever his dog was home alone, and the phone rang, the dog would bark and jump, often triggering the clapper. Imaging your call getting picked up by a barking dog :)

HOW AM I NOT ALREADY SUBSCRIBED TO THIS CHANNEL. You are such a precious bean!

I applaud the presentation!

I remember we made a clapper ourselves in high school. It only supported one outlet, and there was this potentiometer that we could adjust its sensitivity.

I am a huge fan of switched outlets (and even more of switched light fixtures). In the process of rewiring my house, I moved the switch-controlled outlets in our living room from the ones by the CEILING?!!! down to sockets behind the end-tables that actually had lamps on them, so now, instead of only one lamp coming on, and having its cord draped down the entire wall, BOTH lamps come on, and their cords go to sensible outlets near the floor, behind them. It was a lot of work and I'm still very proud of it. :) My poor wife didn't have a living room for two or three weeks...

I like how the advert has lots of clapping in it so that your house becomes a disco every time it plays.

05:00 thank you for including this 😂

A family tradition of ours is to use the "Lamp Commander" for our Christmas tree lights, which uses rudimentary speech recognition. It requires you to speak an initialization phrase of "Lamp Commander" (much like modern smart devices, now that I'm thinking about it.) and listening for the response chirp, after which you can command "Lights on", "Lights off", or "Lights dim". Accidental switching is rather rare and when it does happen, it's humorous rather than frustrating because a random combination of sounds has to first initialize and then activate one of the commands.

Been rocking my X10 “smart home” for 25 years now. We need Alec’s take on X10!

Fascinating story, thanks.

That was a fantastic video. Loved it!

Oh Lord it's that time of year again, the annual hour long Christmas Light Conniption video is just around the corner. Maybe this year we'll get the long awaited "Painting Christmas Lights by Hand UNEDITED [ASMR] 7 HOURS"

I had an Ove-Glove and it was honestly amazing. Lasted over 10 years.

I just found your channel and know its going to take up a lot of my time 😂 awesome content man!

I had one back in the 80s! Loved it! Sometimes the bass of my stereo would set it on/off, which was kind of cool and hilarious

The clapper not "ringing a bell" is such a subtle pun

The Ove Glove is one of my favorite products, had no idea it was made by the same company as The Clapper and the Chia Pet.

what a throwback! husband and i love your channel (as someone HOH, thank you for the subtitles) btw You look great with that haircut!^^

This channel is the absolute BEST use of your super nerdy tendencies, lol!

I find switched outlets useful for things like Christmas lights, fans or heaters where you may need to switch through multiple possible settings before getting to off. At Christmas we regularly have several sets of lights (with their selected flashing / pattern settings) powered by an expansion block from one socket. Turning them off at the socket turns off all sets simultaneously and preserves the flashing/pattern selected for when they are tuned back on again. The same would apply to the heat/fan speed setting on a fan heater for example. Yes I could unplug the item but you only have to step on an upturned three pin UK/Ireland style plug in bare feet once to decide it's better to leave them in the socket and turn off the socket.

Actually, the clapper might be super useful for me. I've never considered it for this (because the clapper's always just been a funny novelty to me), but my Christmas lights always have the plug or on switch in a really annoying place. Being able to turn them on and off by just clapping would be great (especially since I only do it twice a day, normally).

Love the video. Triac might be gentler on sensitive electronics. Since triacs are designed to turn on at the beginning of the sine wave and turn off at the end of the sine wave. Where as a relay will just turn on and off anywhere in the sine wave. If the relay is turning off a device that has an inductive coil you can actually cause a pretty large kickback when the contacts open during the peak of the sine wave.

my dad had an x-10 switch setup for Christmas years back, you just made me remember it when you mentioned it haha

Re the little daughter board with the blob: that’s actually very common, as a first design. The blob typically wants to be on a multilayer board, but those are expensive and you’ll note that the big board is single layer. So, daughter board. You see it a lot on direct mains devices (like WiFi (or X10. I don’t judge.) controlled plug/sockets, for instance) , because they need a really robust single layer main board as well as control electronics.

Switches on the socket have uses. For example, power is not applied till there is full contact, so no arcing damage occurs.

Always wanted one of these

Had a device from Radio Shack back in the day that worked like the clapper on the "away" setting. Any noise turned it on for a given time, very convenient in some situations.