The Bubbling Tale of Who Invented the Lava Lamp

Has there ever been a piece of home decor that more perfectly encapsulates an era than the Lava Lamp? An icon of the psychedelic and hippie movements of the 1960s and 70s, this mesmerizing tube of undulating, brightly-coloured blobs is the perfect mood-setting accessory for when you just want to lay back in your bean bag chair, consume an illegal substance - or two - strum a few lines of your new protest song, and just groove, man. Given the lamp’s indelible association with the counterculture, it is perhaps unsurprising that its inventor was something of a cultural rebel himself - though not in the way you might think. And while the lava lamp might seem like a purely aesthetic object with no practical applications, today this psychedelic device performs a vital service that helps keep the internet safe and secure. So turn on, tune in, and drop out as we dive into the groovy history of the Lava Lamp.

Author: Gilles Messier
Editor: Daven Hiskey
Host: Simon Whistler
Producer: Caden Nielsen

[Hythyr]

My grandparents had one of the original ones, with the holes in the base! It sat on the tv, and my grandmother turned it on every night at 5:00pm, for YEARS!

[anthonyklanke]

I always studied next to my lava lamp. It's excellent for a visual break from reading. Take a moment, gaze out of focus at the mesmerizing lamp, and resume reading. It was the perfect way to study 👍

[HandyMan]

Today I found out, that my lava lamp is just a little bit cooler than I thought it was. Thanks, Simon & Team.

[zoltankaparthy]

In the world of studio audio mixing it is an iron rule that a Lava Lamp must be present. No good record was ever mixed without Lava Lamp input.

[BernicePanders]

I've had a collection of lamps for about 20yrs, including an original 1960s Lava branded psychedelic lamp, a tall purple brushed metal starlight holes glitter lamp, and a Lava Lamp bong... ✌️😎🔥

[Bob_at_OZDiggzguitars]

There is another practical use for "Lava Lamps": Recording Studios used to use them. The idea is, when the engineers arrived at the studio, they'd turn on the main board, amps and mics (full of vacuum tubes), and then turn on the Lava Lamp. When the lava lamp was flowing, the tubes in the equipment were then nice and warmed up.... then they had to find the artist to begin recording, which I'm sure, was even more time consuming than the waiting.

[barbararoberts]

Personally, I don't have a problem with your fast pace speech.

I really enjoyed this, thank you 😊❤️

[jamesdellaneve]

I remember lava lamps used as wall sconces in bowling alley restaurants. Back in those days, they had sit down restaurants and bars in them. And they were accompanied with those spin cigarette ash trays.

[lauren]

Hey, a Simon Whistler video where people aren’t heinously murdered, killed/maimed in a war or had their lives ruined by corporate greed. Cool, man!

[mikeoleksa]

Well I'll be damned! The more you know. I've been in the IT and network security field for 25+ years and did not know about the Cloudflare implementation of lava lamps, or any of the other methods, in their encryption. Pretty ingenious, if you ask me. Even a human element takes away from the randomness of almost everything and computers to generate this kind of randomness are quite a bit more expensive than 100 lava lamps.

[OrcBro]

Hah... I use one as a decoration on my night stand. In combination with lazer projection on the wall (blue-green slowly rotating nebula), it gives off enough ambient light to still see in the dark room, but not enough to glare when i'm watching a movie in the evening. Also it's relaxing. Lava Lamps are awesome 😂

[godofsquirrels]

I love how went from 1st to 3rd wife in 2 minutes with no mention of the second

[stax]

When you said they were being recorded by Cloudflare I immediately knew why and was just stunned by how brilliant that is.

[_BlackWidow]

6:25 he described the lamp's trending similarly to how it operates. pretty cool

[VegemiteWizard]

Love the content Simon, big ups to the excellent writers that keep you oiled.

[Hollylivengood]

When he was explaining the lava lamp wall, was anyone else thinking of the Heart of Gold improbability drive?

[AidanWigger]

Simon saying "groovy" in the most posh voice on Earth is legendary.

[taylorlibby]

My aunt had one of the original Lava Lamps and gave it to me when I went off to university. My roommate decided that the "water" inside was dirty and that he should do me a favor by changing it out for fresh tapwater.🙄

[darlingdeb]

I loovveee lava lamps! I'm so happy that they came back in trend in the late 90s. I miss all the fun, bright colors that were in trend then too.

[nicholasking]

What's your password? . . . Wall of lava lamps. . . Aaaaarrrrgggg I can't hack it!