The second one is just too cool, and has me all nostalgic and wanting to go dig up my high school electronics textbooks.
Those are the wire filaments/display digits inside of a Nixie tube! (For those not in the know, before LED numbers displays, electronics that had to display numbers used these cold-cathode vacuum tubes which were filled with neon.)
The second 8 isn’t actually an illuminated number at all, it’s a second anode to guarantee that all of the numbers in the back-range of the tube can light up as well as those in the front which are closer to the anode screen. This avoids two screens needing to be present.
Thanks for the trip down memory lane Drew!
Wow, I had forgotten about about nixie tubes. I remember using some test equipment that used them.