A Finished Babbage Difference Engine!

You're right, this is very, very cool. I can only imagine how much this cost to make a reality. Brilliant!

Kind of curious about the guy that commissioned the engine.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathan_Myhrvold

The above is a link to the Wikipedia page on Nathan Myhrvold, who commissioned the building of his own Difference Engine No.2. The man in the above video is Doron Swade, who was head of the project to build the first engine for a museum in London. He's also written a book on the saga to do such. The link below is to a Youtube video of a panel where Swade and Myhrvold lecture on the engine at the Computer History Museum.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p1sEowi1Txc

Theres a difference engine built out of K'nex somewhere, I believe...

31 decimal digits? Kind of puts 64-bit computing into perspective.

http://acarol.woz.org/difference_engine.html [woz.org]

...Obligatory plug for Sidney Padua's 2d goggles...

http://sydneypadua.com/2dgoggles/