In preparation for this week’s show, Nora tried out her brand new Wi-Fi Detector Shirt. Check out the video for a demonstration, and a special cameo appearance by Michael Enright at the one-minute mark:
Nora’s real-world test drive of the Wi-Fi Detector Shirt will air on Spark 74 (April 15, & 18, 2009).
Is it just me, or does Michael Enright look a lot more like "Relic" from The Beachcombers than his radio persona would suggest.
If only it told you if they were open or locked-down.
Ha! That's funny. That's what I said when we taped the segment!!
What's sad is that we don't have Wi-Fi throughout the building.
What's the battery life like on something like that?
Don't people at the CBC have better things to do? Like maybe the news?
Well, it took us 2 minutes to shoot, as a visual to accompany an audio segment we recorded for the radio show/podcast; we thought our audience would be interested/entertained. It's, actually a pretty efficient way of doing what is, in fact, our jobs.
Right on the money, Nora. I wonder how many occasional listeners (like me, for instance) were engaged, interested and persuaded to become more regular listeners?
As you seem to understand, it doesn't have to be hard news to inform and enlighten.
Don't be silly, that is news.
Mmmm. That looks as if I'm saying that Nora is silly. It was meant to say that "some Guy"'s post seemed silly. Yikes, it's easy to get in trouble. Sudden thought: would the shirt display be visible on a very sunny day?
It reminds me of mood shirts in the 70s…only cooler.
You can still see it, but it's not as impressive on a sunny day, 'tis true.
Nora, I hope you're not planning on nursing any babies.
I listen to your program on my computer and when you mentioned the video I just popped up Firefox and watched your video. Neat.
I would love to do this more in the rest of this year. I love the idea of the show/podcast being able to 'flip' into multimedia mode (especially in this case, since I admit, I was not very articulate in describing the shirt!)
You should ask your RSS feed guys to include any video links as separate items in the news feed. Then when we who use RSS readers get your new items, we don't have to navigate to the site and find the video. Yes I am that lazy. Well that's not entirely true. I'm lazy in the sence that my blackberry downloads your podcast and that's where I listen to it from. It's great for when I'm driving to and from work (3 hour commute) and when I'm bored at work…like today.
Several years ago I had a Handera CE (fancy palm pilot for engineers with a CF Card slot) and installed an 802.11b access card in it that I bought for a huge amount of money from a dealer in Toronto. It was hard to get because it was still new tech and the supporting software that was on the Handera was buggy and probably still beta but it would allow me to connect to my network at home so I could check my email from the couch. FTW! What it wouldn't do though was let me search for new networks except to say "New Network Found" with no name. So I decided to go for a walk and down Lonsdale Ave in North Vancouver to see if anybody had a free and open connection. I didn't find anything except when I passed a bank. On Lonsdale there are about 3 or 4 big banks on the east side of the street and every time I walked by one I could get a free and open connection to a "New Network Found" but alas couldn't confirm who it was. So I assumed it was the bank. Seemed reasonable and almost too funny that the banks had all these open wifi networks. Even stranger was that every time a bus or big Semi truck drove by, the network would disconnect and I'd have to reconnect again. Even when I was right in front of the bank it still happened and I could figure it out? I thought maybe the busses and trucks were creating some new kind of Interference nobody had ever heard of. Well I wasnt worried, as I didnt think I needed to be able to have kids anyways.
About a year later, I was telling this story to my even geekier friend in the Palm Pilot Usergroup all about my war-walking experience. We laughed and he upgraded my software so I could see the network names. The next day I went for another war-walk and sure it connect but now I could see the name and it was "Lions Gate Hospital". The best part of this is that LGH was about 3 blocks east of where I was on Lonsdale and I was on the west side of the street. I looked up and saw the giant antennas on the tower at LGH and when I walked away from the bank, a Apartment building would block my view of the antenna and I was disconnected. So what I thought was the bank's weak open WIFI signal was really a impressive broadcasting antenna on top of the Lions Gate Hospital that I was able to connect to freely, almost 3 blocks away. And of course every time a bus passed me, it blocked my view of the antenna again.
A few months later I could no longer connect to LGH. I guess the IT department weighed giving their doctors mobile internet access in the entire hospital with all the free access they were giving to the surrounding Apartment buildings in a three block radius. Even funnier is I now work for the very same IT department in Vancouver Coastal Health as a programmer. Oh the irony.
"War-walking" Ha! That's a great story MrFish
Hallo Nora: I think this one is sexy T-shirt! Is it just me, or do this makes your breasts look bigger? Funny postings- like it
Kickass shirt, do want!
Hi Nora
I have had the same shirt for about 8 months. I love it.
Do people stare at you? I found I was really getting a lot of looks!
Kudos for the video – great idea!
It's not really a shirt though as much as it's just a sticker. I mean you could put that on anything couldn't you?
Wi-Fi speedo anybody?
LOL @ 0:52
Too bad there's no way to pause your show on CBC Radio One while we view the video on your site.
Hi Frank. Personally, I use a RadioShark radio tuner, which does allow me to pause live, over-the-air radio: <a href="http://www.griffintechnology.com/products/radiosh…” target=”_blank”>http://www.griffintechnology.com/products/radiosh…
This video, first and foremost, gives us a nice glimpse of the
. Wouldn’t that be fun?
behind-the-scenes ‘human’ side of Sparks. It seems to be
fun and full of personal sparks…
Now, I wonder if that shirt can be adapted to a lie detector (
not to detect the shirt owner lies, of course, but the deception of others
The comment I like the most in this video is Michael Enright's about hopefully NOT finding any wifi signals. He has the right idea. Since wifi or RF is very harmful to health.
I am electrosensitive and if I were to wear this shirt I would be making sure that it didn't light up at all. If it did I would run in the opposite direction.
Electrosensitive? Is that a scientific term? Is there a recognized scientific test for this sensitivity condition?