See the plant IRL!

This is rumor control:

On Wednesday 2/04/2009 (today) the test plant was transported to Palmhuset in Trädgårdsföreningen - a public green house in central Gothenburg, Sweden not far from the experiment location (due to transportation temperature issues). 

Here, the plant will be taken care of by professional garderners until the day it dies and goes to tomato plant heaven. Feel free to visit the plant IRL for the following weeks/months for as long as it lives. Open weekdays between 10.00 and 16.00.

More info and directions at: www.tradgardsforeningen.se

(If you decide to visit it and talk to it, please say something nice.)

The End

Hello there. 

Once again. Thank you all for participating in this experiment. This is a short news flash to let you all know that we have gathered all the facts and figures from the Interactive Ketchup Growing Experiment : Talk to the plant - and we are currently working on the Official Experiment Report and Hypothesis Testing that will be published at talktotheplant.com within short!

And that’s not all...

...tomorrow we are moving the testplant to it’s terminal station as it will be re-planted at a public green house and garden in Sweden. More news, and images, on that soon!

Also! Stay tuned for the final time-lapse from the experiment, more facts and images and the answer to the question we’ve all been waiting for: Does the human voice have any affect on plant growth?

Ok, 'til then - take care // No one grows ketchup like Heinz

WEEK 7 - HELLO 2009

Hello again. We are closing in on the final part of the experiment. Not a minute too soon it seems, since both plants once again have outgrown the experiment rig. 

As some of you may have noticed, we could not help ourselves from spreading the holiday spirit and add some Christmas decorations during the holidays. Today, however, the little Christmas elves and the Christmas tree ball was removed and once again we are focused on measuring, testing, reporting and participating, right? Here are the last 10 messages sent:

1. love
2. i love you!
3. dd
4. dd
5. what's up?
6. what
7. miaow
8. hi
9. gambare!
10. hi

The usual mix it seems. Our measuring guy is back next week and then we will have the final report on how the plant growth and development really turned out. Until then...

... Happy New Year! // No one grows ketchup like Heinz

WEEK 6 EVALUATION

Original experiment time was set to six week - and now we are here. 

It’s been decided since start that weekly evaluations should control any decisions to prolong the experiment. With the massive participation (16.300 messages in this writing moment) that has been generated without any advertising - it’s clear that The Interactive Ketchup Growing Experiment has been a much appriciated project and attracted far more attention than expected.

We are currently working on initial evaluations for the test of hypothesis, further investigation and the complete review - but until we reach the point where plants are unable to grow due to room size and we run out of experiment fundings - we have collectively decided to prolong the experiment this year out. 

Hopefully this will result in even higher participation numbers and more messages to the plant. 

Once again, thank you everyone who has participated in the experiment. Keep up the good work!

HAPPY HOLIDAYS! // No one grows ketchup like Heinz.

random messages part deux

Hello everyone! Here’s some recent things said to the plant.

HAPPY TUESDAY!

karen loves you

slayer rocks

HOLA PLANTITA!

jag och linda ska titta på hey

hej mamma!

tell melinda that i’m running late

dance plant, dance!

liebe kleine pflanze ich hoffe du wachst bald in eine grosse pflanze

monica monica monica monica monica monica monica

Keep em' coming! Thank you for participating. More news within short! 

And what a race it is!

The experiment goes on, and once again the reference plant is in the lead!



The latest measurement shows that the plants has grown seven and ten centimeters since the last one was made. But it's the reference plant that has grown ten! We're feeling flabbergasted, but maybe it's because of the test plant being fed messages like "gogogo you reversed pothead", "bye nerrrrd" and "hey shut up you'll never grow"? We don't know!

But anyway, please keep sending more positive messages!

Rebuilding the rig... again!

Yep. We have outgrown ourselves again. This time, the small pots had to go. 

Bigger, better pots...

...to create the possibility to outgrow ourselves again.

Stay tuned!

Encouraging words

Although the variety of messages sent to our plant is extremely wide, we can still see that positive words make up the majority of them. For a visual representation of which words are the most commonly used so far, just look at the image below!

It's over 10.000!

Yay!

Today we went over 10.000 written, read and broadcasted messages to our test plant. Good work everyone who has participated so far. We are half-way through the set experiment time and the result is overwhelming. Also, today, as you may have read already - the test plant once again grew past the control plant. Sweet.

And this is message number ten thousand:

"everybody if you can, do the bartman, shake your body, if you can turn it out man"

How about that.

Moving on: Since Sweden, where the plants are situated, is pretty much pitch black this time of the year - we gradually have to increase the amount of artificial light to simulate spring/summer instead of winter. Today, we’re gonna increase the "sun" with one more hour a day.

Which hopefully will make some of our American participants happy, since they’re usually at work when the plants go to sleep over here.

Stay sunny // No one grows ketchup like Heinz.

Back in the lead!

Our test plant has been falling behind the reference plant for quite some time, but todays measurement shows that it's once again back in the lead!



We think this is fairly amazing! The last measurement was taken just this Friday, and the test plant has grown seven centimeters since then (while the reference plant has grown just three)!

Please keep sending more love and encouragement to it!

LOVE is all we need!

This is rumor control:

Todays measurement shows that our control plant is getting ahead. Are we not giving enough love here? Is the theory of human breath something to consider? Interesting development none the less.

Here are some things said to the plant, that we feel could be a part of the problem:

1. gnnnn fock 

2. mary is hairy

3. this is the strangest life i have ever known

We cannot see how these sentences will provide any help of growth! Most people are still writing positive and scientifically smart stuff - and we need more of that.

Come on now. Spread the love. And help the plant!

Stay nice // No one grows ketchup like Heinz

NEW RIG!

So, now we’ve got a new rig - one that allows our test plant to reach the moon more or less.

The rebuilding took a bit longer than expected - but all for the better.

The time-lapse will look a bit strange for a few days, since we changed the angle of the cameras, but please keep talking to our little plant!

Stay tuned! 

Rebuilding the rig!

For about 1 hour the experiment will be on hold - due to reconstruction of the IRL tomato rig. The plants have grown out of the frame we set to monitor their development. Clearly, we did not expect such massive growth in only two weeks. Exciting!

Please excuse the short break and do return when the new rig is up and running!

Stay sharp // No one grows ketchup like Heinz.

Timelapse progress of week two.

We made a little timelapse trailer-ish kind of clip. It shows the progress from first two weeks (almost -  on monday it is two whole weeks) - please feel free to share.

Up next: Extreme out of frame growth requires rebuilding the rig! Stay tuned!

"No, it's not Glögg" and new measurements.

We water the plants everyday, and no, we don't use Glögg when we do it.



This morning we measured the plants once again, and the reference plant is once again in the lead!



To help the test plant out, please send as much encouraging words to it as possible. If they do any good, you must help us prove it!

We're still working on a solution to the height-issue and we've got a few ideas, but it might involve "re-rigging" the, uhm, rig. So if the live cam feed temporarily goes down, don't panic, it's just us working on improvements!

Added plant support. Despair follows.

We went out and bought hair clips to further support the plants:




Unfortunately, the result is, well, encouraging and troublesome at the same time:



The main issue is that there really is no space to move the cameras further away from the plants. Hopefully we will come up with a solution soon.

Meanwhile, keep supporting the plant by sending loving and encouraging words in its way!

A selection of sent messages.

Here’s a list of 10 selected messages from the first week, we felt stood out a bit:

1. no brian. i will not do that with you.

2. please grow big and strong so i can pour you on my veggie burger

3. 100 million dollars

4. you can do it

5. hahah no i’m from istanbul turkey

6. i won’t let the snails get you

7. i want to feel your body, mister ketchup

8. you will taste great on my fries

9. gabby, i love you

10. when dogs bark. please smile. do not throw stones.

The most common message? It’s not that surprisingly "grow" or "grow plant".

Stay tuned//No one grows ketchup like Heinz.

My oh my!

This morning when we came into our office we, as we usually do, opened up http://www.talktotheplant.com to have a look at how our plants are doing. And behold! They're doing great! Just have a look at this picture, showing a shot of the site from this morning right next to the one Malin took yesterday afternoon.



As a side note we think it seems like the test plant now is both taller and sturdier (We'll measure them later)! Could this be because of the huge increase in messages sent to it? Keep'em coming!

Tall or sturdy?

First week’s evaluation, and measurement is due. So, how are we doing so far?

1. Test plant is thicker and sturdier!

2. Reference plant is taller...

So, what’s more important? To be tall, or to be big? Anyway, 2416 messages sent to test plant in this writing moment. Let’s see what happens next.

Stay tuned. 

And do visit our little plant once a day - and talk to it!

Up up!

These plants are indeed quite able. Measurements today showed that in just the little time they've been living with us they've both reached a length above 35 centimeters. It's a bit hard to measure them accurately using a ruler, since they aren't exactly straight. But we had to get by with what we had for now.



We're a bit concerned with the plants soon growing out of picture and we're currently discussing how to tackle this particular problem. We will of course keep you posted on the matter.



The pictures were sneakishly screen-captured from the live site by Malin while Stefan was checking out the length and putting up Post-its behind the plants.

A small observation might be in place: Notice that the test plant is a bit shorter than the reference one? It indeed is, but it's on the other hand wider and sturdier. We're not entirely sure what is best and how to properly analyze this situation, but we do know that you should keep on sending your love towards the test plant!