Cheerlights

December 1, 2011 6:09 AM

This holiday season, if you plan on decorating your home with lights, why not put in some Cheerlights, a set of lights linked to a controller that responds to tweets. Instructional Video using Arduino, ioBridge, and Color Effects LED lighting.

Or, if you just want to mess with someone else's Christmas lights, just tweet a color hashtagged with #cheerlights.

posted by Deathalicious (9 comments total)

Cheerlights site is down..
So, if I wanted to build something like this, how much would it cost (roughly, and assuming I start from no supplies)
posted by inigo2 at 6:53 AM on December 1, 2011

A short article on reverse engineering GE Color Effects.
posted by zamboni at 6:53 AM on December 1, 2011

inigo2:: So, if I wanted to build something like this, how much would it cost (roughly, and assuming I start from no supplies)

Those GE lights run about $100 per 40-foot run on Amazon, but the article zamboni linked cites $60 at Costco.
posted by Doofus Magoo at 7:05 AM on December 1, 2011

They're $65 at Costco but I watched the entire inventory, hundreds and hundreds of them, sell out in a day or two at the one near Microsoft headquarters in Kirkland. It took a couple of days longer at the Costco in north Seattle.

Last year they were $49.
posted by bz at 8:02 AM on December 1, 2011

GE--putting the Vegas on your house since...
posted by stormpooper at 8:12 AM on December 1, 2011

On Christmas Day a series of tweets designed to produce a specific pattern of flashing lights will go out, causing a pattern of lights that implants a hypnotic suggestion into anyone who views them, making them a potential assassin.

i've been watching a lot of fringe recently
posted by The Whelk at 8:40 AM on December 1, 2011 [2 favorites]

Nah, it'll never work. It'll get Britta'd up, somehow.
posted by maryr at 9:20 AM on December 1, 2011

oh twitter, is there nothing absolutely useless you can't do?
posted by sexyrobot at 12:00 PM on December 1, 2011

For a while, I was going to be involved with the new version of the Electric Rainbow Machine.

Peter had this working, which is pretty cool, but lacked refinement. We were going to make another using full colour LEDs. Looking at that first link's video, I think the constraints of the original system lead to much more interesting results.
posted by Chuckles at 3:11 PM on December 1, 2011