Technology can't help the stupid
- December 7, 2006 4:28 PM |
- By Tod Maffin
I'm always amazed to see product like this one come out: Some new gadget flashes a red light when it's too loud around you. The idea is it's supposed to help you know when to, you know, move the hell away from the ear-piercing noise.
This is one of those "it looks good on a news release" kind of products, in my opinion. It has one fundamental flaw: You have to have the device with you for it to work. Duh.
As the article notes, "Say you're near a tractor and worry the noise is loud enough to cause ear damage. Press your thumb on the handheld device's sound port to see whether it's too loud. Likewise, you can press your iPod's ear buds against the port to know whether you ought to turn the volume down."
Really? Has society gotten this dumb?
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Comment (1)
It's not that society has gotten dumb. People are really, really bad at measuring sound levels on their own. It's especially bad since the ear acclimatizes to louder levels. It's only after you've left the loud concert that you realize your ears are ringing and that it must have been much too loud (and not all concerts are too loud). Having a non-acclimatizing portable unit is a good idea. This particular gadget sucks, though, since it's about as big as a normal Sound Pressure Level (SPL) meter, about as expensive, gives much less information, and is even less sexy. A unit the size of an iPod nano or even shuffle would make sense, this one does not.