If you'd like to make your own Internet connected printer similar to The Happiness Machine then here's a few details of how to go about doing it. It's not step by step as such but hopefully it'll give you a head start if you want to give it a go.
Things you'll need
- Nanode (you could also use an Arduino with an Ethernet shield)
- Mini Thermal Printer available from Cool Components or Spark Fun
- 5v 2A wall wart style power adapter
- A momentary push button - like this one
- A PHP server
Putting it all together
Wire up the push button to pin 7 on the Nanode - here's a tutorial on the Arduino site
Follow this tutorial to find out how to wire up the thermal printer.
Grab this PHP code and upload to your web server. My example gets data from Wefeelfine.org. Feel free to change the data source to be anything you want. As long as you return a string beginning with "data=" the printer will simply print the contents.
Attach the Ethernet lead to the Nanode.
Get this code from Gist, change the web server details to where ever you've uploaded the above script and upload it to your Nanode. You'll need the Ethercard library.
Everything should now work. It should tell you it is connected and then if you press the button it should fetch some data. Or it might not. Play with it, figure it out.
To have it all self contained use the 5V 2A supply. You'll need a 2A supply otherwise the printer will reset the Nanode when it prints as it draws about 1.5A.