'Telectroscope' Connects New York To London In Real-Time:

NEW YORK — Hello, London! Jolly good show, New York!

New Yorkers could see their English cousins across the pond Thursday without benefit of cable TV or video conferencing, courtesy of an unusual live optical hookup created by a conceptual artist with a fanciful tale of a long-lost tunnel.

An optical device called a "telectroscope" was placed at the Fulton Ferry Landing in Brooklyn and another one on the Thames River in London on Thursday.

Spectators stepped up to the machine on both sides of the Atlantic and waved and wrote greetings to each other in real time on wipe-off message boards.

They told knock-knock jokes, asked about the weather and found time for a few shout-outs to Queen Elizabeth and the Manchester United soccer team.

How long until this thing turns into a means of insulting one another from across the pond? Still, it is a really cool toy.