Is this "mechanical"?

For those who want to read the wiki article:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barometric_light

If you've never seen neon up close, plasma is such an incredible light source. It's like the light is just floating being emitted from empty space. I took a neon workshop a few years ago, and it became clear why people are still willing to painstakingly make these signs - there is really nothing comparable to them, they're like magic

I wish I could just buy one of these as a commercial product. I'll never be able to make this and it's too cool to not be able to buy.

I wish these could be made with something non toxic. Having one on my desk to shake would be a great fidget spinner.

for a moment I thought this was going to be about arc-lights in the 1800s that mechanically touch electrodes and then draw apart

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arc_lamp

it's amazing how far we've come

think about Benjamin Franklin twenty-five years before Declaration of Independence naming the first "battery" (out of the concept of lined-up artillery) by connecting a series of lynden jars (basically capacitors) - he also invented the concept of +/- positive and negative

now we've got space telescopes and probes leaving the solar system

imagine what's coming in another 300 years