Long before we all had access to the internet, there was a small group of people worldwide who were able to make worldwide contacts and communicate. Unfortunately, there was no one in my area who was interested in this, but the idea always fascinated me immensely. The threshold for learning Morse code is unfortunately high and broadcasting on short and medium wave radio frequencies requires permits and exams. Too much effort in a time when we can make free and easy video calls to the entire world.

But my interest in classic Morse keys, the button with which you generate the short and long signals, has always remained. What I find beautiful is the precise adjustment options with which everyone can adjust such a simple push button completely to their own wishes: more or less counter-pressure and a longer or shorter path to the switching point. My self-designed Morse key has these adjustment options and uses magnets to provide the counter-pressure.

In order to make this classic Morse key usable for a large audience, I decided to combine it with the simple one-button game ‘Flappy Bird’. This game was a huge hit on mobile phones in 2013 and was created by Vietnamese programmer Nguyễn Hà Đông. However, this developer was so shocked by the overwhelming attention and the addictive nature of the game that he decided to remove the app from the Apple App Store and Google Play in February 2014.

My version of the game is graphically much simpler because it works on a monochrome display and is controlled by a microcontroller, which has much less processing power than a mobile phone. But I still managed to make it work smoothly. And the best part: when you play the game, to untrained ears it seems as if you are typing Morse code with the greatest of ease!

The name “Marconi” is a reference to the Italian Guglielmo Marconi, who is considered in the Western world to be the inventor of radio.