Inflatable Loudspeakers

fm6 sent in an article running at New Scientist talking about new technology that allows Inflatable Loud Speakers. The technology is apparently patented and there's not a lot of technical details, but I have to say the concept amuses me. And I somehow doubt that this technology will ever be used in high fidelity home systems.

Comments

Well, just another device

[epsalon]

you need to blow air into for it to play sounds...
Flute, anyone?

Re:Well, just another device

[Marcus Brody]

Blow up loud speakers?

I did this years ago to my wolfendale's - playing napalm death with the amp turned up to 11...

BOOM!

"Was the big bang louder than drum & bass?" -- AliG

My Inflateable Life

[MBCook]

This should go great with my inflateable couch, pillows, and girl :)

All I need now is an inflateable stero and some inflateable CDs. Seriously though, how cool is this? And wouldn't it be awesome to inflate/deflate them while their ON? Bet that would sound awesome.

Re:My Inflateable Life

[PD]

This should go great with my inflateable couch, pillows, and girl :)

With all that, I'm surprised that your ego isn't inflated.

Re:My Inflateable Life

[Glytch]

Absolutely right. There's something about the concept of moving an apartment's worth of furniture in a Volkswagen Golf that's just too cool to fathom.

*Sigh* But I have to have lame wooden stuff... oh well.

Re:My Inflateable Life

[snake_dad]

*Sigh* But I have to have lame wooden stuff... oh well.

Well, no one is stopping you from blowing *that* up :-)

Re:My Inflateable Life

[billcopc]

Does that mean that a Real Life comes with a RealCouch, RealPillows, RealDoll and RealSpeakers ? Would that make you a RealPlayer ?

Poor roadies?

[dimer0]

Since when do roadies complain of back problems? Is this opening the doors up to elderly women who want to travel with bands and set up stages? A 4x12 cabinet is not that heavy at all, some even have wheels, and most of them have handles. They're not awkward. I used to lug mine around when I was a 120 pound stick in high school.. Ah well.

Also, if these things are so light, it would be funny to see the speakers push so much air that the air-cabinet starts floating away.. I wouldn't dare stack these things, a gust of wind could stop a concert..

This definitely didn't have to change.. I just hope it's a proof of concept, and they'll find something better to apply this technology to at a later time.. (Pool speakers???)

Re:Poor roadies?

[fgodfrey]

You obviously haven't tried stacking a medium to large sized PA. I've helped set up stacks of TurboSound speakers 3 high/3 wide + subs (ok, I know, that's not an enormous setup, but it's not for your bedroom either) and while they have wheels, they are quite awkward and heavy. However, I strongly suspect that these speakers will sound pretty bad at high volumes when the bladder starts to vibrate, but hey, I could be wrong. They would certainly look interesting, though :)

Re:Poor roadies?

[spudnic]

Actually you may have hit upon a great idea... Fill them up with helium and let the speakers float above the crowd! Talk about trippy.

Quick, patent it!

Re:Poor roadies?

[kfg]

Most of them, actually. It is, litrally, backbreaking work.

Bear in mind also that speakers often have to be hauled to *hights.* The wheels are useless then. With inflatables you haul could haul 'em up deflated and inflate them in place. Windage wouldn't be a problem, they would be cabled in place, * just as they are now.*

One more factor is space. Did you know that when you buy a box of breakfast cereal the cereal itself only costs you about a quarter? Transporting the BOX takes up much of the rest of the price. A Smaller and lighter transport package means less space and fuel needed just to haul the buggers around.

I have hauled my own PA. It's a pain in the neck, back and elsewhere. I'd love an inflatable rig.

I've also worked on a professional crew, and let me tell you, hauling your own PA around is NOTHING compared to hauling in, setting up, and hauling out, two truckloads of speakers, day, after day, after day.

Come to think of it, I've never known a roadie who DIDN'T complain of back trouble. It's the main reason for retirement.

KFG

Re:Poor roadies?

[Kinetix303]

Yeah, I used to set up raves and concerts with 16 S4 boxes and I thought those were hell.... then moved on to kits with 16 DAS RF-215s and 16 custom Dual JBL 18" in DAS cabinets and I thought those were hell. Then we moved to EAW stacks, which were seemingly endless and seemingly infinitely heavy.

What we decided was that the most efficient way for roadies to lift and setup large kits was just to numb our bodies by quickly slamming back three beers and running to install the gear in that period where we were numb but before we got clumsy.

Worked like a charm.

Re:Poor roadies?

[roman_mir]

Screw Helium, let's fill'em up with Hydrogen and paint with some aluminum paint (the more explosive the better) at the end of a concert an electric spark must be set on the speakers' surface so that the speakers must burst into flames and blow up, now that's enterntainment!

Helium?

[infinite9]

If you fill them with helium, will your music sound like the chipmonks?

Re:Helium?

[Reality Master 101]

Would it? The sound waves might possibly travel faster through helium because they don't have to vibrate as much mass, but would it change the pitch? The pitch is the vibrational velocity of the medium. I don't see how just a lighter medium would cause the pitch to rise.

Or to put it another way, the cone of the speaker is moving the gas at a certain rate. What would cause the gas to accelerate to a different rate?

Now, it's possible that you would get better high range out of the speaker in a lighter medium, because the speaker doesn't have to move as much mass. Just like I can vibrate a feather about the same rate as a small rock, but I couldn't vibrate a 5 pound weight very quickly.

Re:Helium?

[Reality Master 101]

My understanding of the helium effect is that the lighter gas coming from your lungs causes the gas to go past your vocal cords faster, thus causing a higher pitched sound. This is in contrast to how a speaker works, which is to vibrate a cone at a certain rate, independent of the surrounding gas.

patented?

[stickb0y]

The technology is apparently patented and there's not a lot of technical details

I thought the patent process requires that the inventor disclose information about how the product works, and after the patent expires the public can use it freely. Isn't it opposed to a trade secret, where the inventor doesn't get protection if someone else reverse-engineers the product or happens to invent the same thing independently?

Re:patented?

[geekoid]

thats correct, the tech. details are disclosed in an american patent(can't speak for other countries, but its probably the same)
If this is a patented item, as opposed to patent pending, you should be able to go th the US Patent and copyright website and look them up.

Re:patented?

[hearingaid]

RTFA.

The company is cagey about details, but a patent describes one way in which an inflatable speaker might work.

The disclosure's in the patent. Normally, companies with patents don't talk much in public: they're already giving stuff away in the patent, they don't want to give any more.

Watch out for ricocheting guitars

[MagnaMark]

A speaker driver is mounted in a flat, rigid board bonded to a large bladder. When the bladder is inflated, it expands to form a box shape resembling a speaker cabinet.

I'd like to see the first time someone tries to dramatically smash their guitar against the speakers at the end of a set.

from the article

[geekoid]

Inflatable loudspeakers could blow out roadies
so now rock bands will want to set up there own system? including filling them full of air? what about the speaker itself, will that suddenly get lighter?

talk about trying to market to a problem that doesn't exist, sheeesh.

if all things are equal(same sound quality, etc,etc,etc...) then there only advantage is less storage space. Which is a cost savings advantge.

Inflatable Technology

[Alien54]

And I thought that the story line in Sluggy Freelance was a joke

Now I am starting to get scared.

RealSpeakers

[Dolly_Llama]

I'll to get some to entertain my *inflate* *inflate* girlfriend..

inflatable speaker go boom

[trb]

And if you want your bass to go boom, you over-inflate them.

Soundtube

[aethera]

I've worked with some SoundTube products before. They were excellent. We used thew in several hanging locations and on the ground in theme parks, so they received a 70 volt distributed PA signal. They played a mix of classical and pop music all day. Sound quality was not excellent, but certainly very good. They were very power efficient and very durable. Bats, Birds, Bees, rain, manure, even lawnmovers attacked these things on a daily basis and they still worked great. One of the nicest outdoor PA speakers I ever worked with.

To the contrary

[Bud Dwyer]

And I somehow doubt that this technology will ever be used in high fidelity home systems.

I fancy myself something of an audiophile, and I can say with all certainty that the inflatable loudspeaker is the most exciting new development in the home audio world of the last 5 years.

Last month's issue of Home Audiophile Review carried an interesting article on the possiblities of the new, inflatable enclosures. Essentially, we will be able to get distortion down to unheard of low levels. The possiblities presented by speaker enclosures in novel shapes is also interesting. Imagine a spherical, or for that matter, tetrahedral, enclosure. You can't do that with wood. Another plus: the enclosures could be filled with nitrogen so as to minimize corrosion of the internal speaker components, thus lengthening product-life and improving sound quality.

Re:To the contrary

[kwhilden]

As a very dedicated audiophile, I can't imagine that inflatable speakers could sound good at all. Can you say uncontrolled cabinet resonance? The biggest problem with wooden box speakers is the resonance from the wood creating unwanted coloration in the sound. I don't think it is possible to brace an inflatable speaker enough to reduce resonance to any significant degree.

As far as building tetrahedral speakers out of wood, check out these from Acoustic Reality. I happen to own a pair, and resonance control is outstanding. They also sound great and are very cheap by audiophile standards.

btw, I am audiophile lunatic... ugh.
KW

Re:To the contrary

[Chris Johnson]

Um...

The only reason you'd want a spherical enclosure is because the _outside_ of a sphere produces the evenest response. Unfortunately the inside is the single worse shape for an enclosure you could have.

Plus, in general terms, wall rigidity is enormously important for a speaker enclosure. Now, there's two sides to this: on the one hand you want vibrations to be damped down effectively, and in this the inflatable might even wind up with some advantages. Unfortunately the other side is that walls are rigid for a reason.

You could do a dipole this way by using the inflatable for the back wave, but there's barely any difference between that and NO enclosure at all. These equate to just the driver sitting there. The worst aspect, bar none, is bass and dynamic impact. Treble, diffraction and cabinet coloration might be improved somewhat over cheap plywood- but at what cost?

Sorry- you've been spun. These aren't the speakers you've been looking for. Move along..

Re:To the contrary

[frantzdb]

You mean this Home Audiophile Review"?

Yea. Right.

--Ben

Re:To the contrary

[radja]

>Another plus: the enclosures could be filled with nitrogen so as to minimize corrosion of the internal speaker components... [snip]

hmm.. fill with Helium, and let float on a string? should give good acoustic decoupling. On the other hand.. Bach on Helium *shiver*

//rdj

This Brings New Meaning...

[dbCooper0]

to: Damn - I just Blew a Speaker!

Seriously, I (as a musician with a little experience building cabinets for 18" and smaller drivers), seem to remember that the heavier, the better - at least for Bass Enclosures.

I doubt there is a valid market.

The day has passed since JBL rocked with alnico magnets - you could walk into a music store with a notepad and tape measure, then go back you your garage and cut up some 3/4" or 5/8" particle board, and save big bucks. No patent infringement - I didn't sell 'em - no, really! ;-)

YAIP (Yet Another Inflatible Pun)

[The Iconoclast]

Pump up the Jam! Pump it Up! Pump it UP!!

Terminology is wrong

[dwlemon]

"..rock groups need roadies to hump.."

No. Those are groupies.

here's the patent info...

[chthonicphage]

Patent Number: WO0154541 (UK)
Publication date: 2001-08-02
Inventor(s): WIENER DAVID
Applicant(s):: SOUNDTUBE ENTERTAINMENT INC (US)

A speaker assembly (100) is provided including a rigid front speaker mounting element (102) defining at least one speaker mounting opening (103), at least one speaker driver (104) coupled to the at least one speaker mounting opening (103) of the speaker mounting element (102), at least one flexible bladder (106) at least partially forming the sides and rear of the enclosure and coupled to the speaker mounting element (102), and a valve (108) coupled to the flexible bladder (106). The flexible bladder (108) has a first wall portion (110) and a second wall portion (112) defining a substantally air-tight interior space (114) therebetween and may take any desired shape when inflated. Together, the speaker mounting element (102) and the bladder (106) form at least one interior chamber (116) at least partially surrounding the speaker driver (104). The valve (108), which provides a substantially air-tight seal when closed, is in fluid communication with the interior space of the flexible bladder (106) and can be used for inflation and deflation of the bladder (106). The bladder (106) is inflatable by providing either pressurized gas or expandable foam within the interior space. Alternatively, the bladder may be formed as a plurality of independently inflatable cells, or may be evacuatably-formed from a material having shape retaining memory properties. After use, the bladder (106) enclosure may be removed from the speaker mounting elemet (102), and deflated for reuse, or disposed of.

Re:here's the patent info...

[cr0sh]

Explanation for those who don't speak patent-ese:

Take a piece of plywood. Cut a hole, mount a speaker on the front. Now, build a plastic/rubber bladder/balloon to attach to the sides, so that your now have a "box shape" - optionally with side "arms" to hold the edges forming the sides ridged. Add a valve and pump it up.

In other words, the bladder forms the structure to hold the speaker up, and the plywood panel serves to have a place to mount the speaker.

Bet I know what it sounds like, too - CRAP! This is basically a "boxless" or "baffless" design - where the panel is just a speaker mounting point, not much else (keeps a little sound from radiating forward). Grab a speaker design book from the 50s, early 60s, and you will see this design. Even then it sucked, just not as bad because speakers in general weren't that great.

These "blow-up" speakers might be OK if the bladder is of a sufficiently thick material, and it is kept at a high pressure level, but they won't be "great"...

If it worked, I bet smaller bands could use this.

[Mustang Matt]

Think of all the bands that can't afford to fly their equipment around. Now they could.

I bet there is some really interesting things that could be done with this technology.

For instance, could you change the response of the speakers by adding more air pressure inside of the enclosure? Seems like you could easily tune for each song if you wanted to.

Almost Certainly Bullshit

[crucini]

The audio world is crawling with hopeful inventors who don't understand much about sound and electro-accoustics. I've had the privilege of seeing many of these "inventions" first hand. The article failed to address the key issue behind "inflatable speakers": rigidity. In a vented box, which is the most common type of low-frequency and very-low-frequency system, the walls need to be pretty rigid to prevent distortion and energy loss. If these inventors have some way to make a balloon as rigid as 3/4" birch plywood with closely spaced transverse braces, the article doesn't mention it.

The only kinds of speaker enclosure that aren't concerned with rigidity are those that simply enclose rigid horns made of fibreglas, plastic or wood. In these situations, the enclosure merely protects the components from dust, water and damage and does not serve an accoustic funciton. JBL among others has realized this and is making a series of touring speakers which are simply frames of metal tubing with no side walls. Again, inflatable walls would add nothing to such a system.

As for the "beach ball" idea, this can be interpreted in two different ways, due to the lack of detail in the article. If you make a conventional (sealed or vented box) speaker system with spherical form, it will have a sharp resonant peak related to the diameter of the sphere. This peak can be reduced by increasing the absorbent material inside the enclosure, but still reflects a design mistake. A sphere is the worst possible shape for a conventional speaker enclosure. A second application of a sphere is to place it in front of a speaker (possibly a tweeter) creating in effect a radial horn. By careful positioning, two or even three transducers could share one sphere. An inflated beach ball could work for high and even mid frequencies. As the frequency gets lower, however, the need for rigidity of the sphere increases. In general, the sphere should be hard and rigid.

Such a system will never work as well as separate, properly designed horns for the separate transducers. Its only benefit is visual gimmickry and possible cost savings.

Re:Almost Certainly Bullshit

[Reality Master 101]

If these inventors have some way to make a balloon as rigid as 3/4" birch plywood with closely spaced transverse braces, the article doesn't mention it.

I think most of us probably have an image of some cheap inflatable pool float, but we don't really know what materials this is made out of or what pressure it is inflated to. Put it this way, what if the enclosure were made of tire rubber and inflated to 250 pounds pressure, with cross braces etc? It would probably be pretty rigid.

Now, I doubt that scenerio that I just laid out would give you any weight or cost savings, but it's an idea of how this might go if that used more interesting materials. :)

Re:Almost Certainly Bullshit

[squaretorus]

Patent and secrecy issues prevent these details coming out, so you might be right that this is BS, but...

Some pretty incredible advances have been made in flat panel speakers AND in producing rigid inflatable structures (space, life saving equipment, temporary structural supports in the construction industry) which, if brought together COULD give the kind of rigidity needed to make some QUITE loud low frequency speakers.

New materials offering incredible strength can be inflated to high pressures with minimal distortion, and be heat sealed into pretty complex shapes - so the kind of bracing needed wouldn't be a problem. Most of these, however, are manufactured using complex multi stage processes basing on a woven substructure with plastic coatings. Great - but expensive.

I agree, however, that the article in the New Scientist certainly fals below their usual high standards by skipping over ALL of the obvious questions with the lame old 'they wont say'. If they won't say how it works, how do we know this isn't just BS?

Re:Almost Certainly Bullshit

[joss]

I did read the articles, and while they are not as simplistic or jingoistic as TV news, they are extraordinarily selective in what they leave out. Imagine if someone tried to explain why America was bombing Afghanistan without mentioning what happened on Sept 11. They could write something that seemed balanced and thoughtful, but would leave you screaming "hang on a moment.."

When Madelene Albright responded to a question on the deaths of 500,000 Iraqi children with "we think the price was worth it" this caused a fair bit of anger. You may reply that these deaths are Saddam Hussein's fault, maybe they are, but that is not how it is perceived in the middle east. Saddam Hussein is widely hated too. The fact that the US supported Saddam with arms and funds while he was doing our bidding doesn't help much. He wasn't a nice person then either. Neither was Osama bin Laden when the CIA was funding him.

Indonesia is mentioned in the articles as an example of a progressive praiseworthy Islamic regmine that the US is friendly with. The fact that they slaughtered a large chunk of the population of East Timor seems relevent here.

Syria is discussed as an example of a terribly repressive Islamic regime. Fair enough, but here is an interesting fact: they imprison a smaller percentage of their population than the US. If America is such a paradigm of freedom, why does it have the largest prison population in the world.

If you really want to understand why America is hated, you won't find it by reading newsweek. You will find it by reading things like http://www.zmag.org http://english.pravda.ru/main/2001/10/11/17799.htm l or pakistani news sources

The accusations against the US might be a completely unjustified pack of lies, but you should at least know what the accusations are. You cannot possibly refute them if they are not even mentioned.

Re:Almost Certainly Bullshit

[joss]

> Because we are not oppressive, and grant our citizens more freedom.

Well, that's one theory. Since America has the 2nd highest level of incarceration in the world, just behind Russia, I guess that means that you are less oppressive than everywhere except Russia. Possibly there is more to it than that, and you are considering your country through rose tinted spectacles. In fact, once you have thought about it for a while, and examined which countries have the highest levels of imprisonment, you might realise that having vast numbers of people in prison is not a good sign. Try to consider the possibility that your interpretation of facts tends to favor explanations which reflect well upon America.

> I don't see how its helpful to list all the lies that circulate through the Islamic countries. That's just a symptom of the fact that they hate us.

The stuff that the Islamic world believes about the USA is more the cause of the hatred than a symptom of it. It's worth looking at the accusations - if they are simply false, then surely there are measures the US can take to correct the misinformation. That rumour about 4000 Israelis (the rumour spoke of Israelis rather than jews) is easily refuteable bullshit of course. Some of the other accusations (such as USA's pro-Israel bias) are not so easy to dismiss. It's worth looking at what your opponents say - if it's nothing but a pack of lies, great.

Re:Almost Certainly Bullshit

[joss]

> I don't see this as a problem of the US government, but a problem of the culture

It's certainly a problem *for* the US government. For what it's worth, I agree that the problem is cultural. I also agree that welfare, in its current form at least, exacerbates the problem. Most of the worst problems can be tracked to the fact that we have a debt-based economy (money is invented by banks), but I can't be bothered to go into that just now. Black culture in the US is completely fucked up, identifying the culprits for this is less important than trying to make it less fucked up. Throwing a large chunk of them into prison on drug offences doesn't help any.

Re:Almost Certainly Bullshit

[crucini]

Every singel enclosure have a resonance frequency!

Most enclosures have more than one resonant frequency. A typical rectangular box will have three major resonances related to the dimensions. That's why speakers don't have dimensions that are integer multiples of each other. A spherical shape puts all the resonance eggs in one basket. An enclosure shaped like Linus Torvalds would not have a sharp resonant peak.

Unless you build it VERY big then the peak will be outside och the frequency range you can hear.

The speed of sound is roughly 1100 ft/sec. An enclosure with parallel walls one foot apart will resonate at 1100 hz, which is certainly audible. Could you possibly have been thinking of radio waves?

Indoor/Outdoor

[uigrad_2000]

In my church, they would be easy to hang from the top of the ceiling. (I can't imagine what it's like lifting a 30lb speaker all the way up there!)

For outdoor concerts, they could be filled with helium, and allowed to float. Wouldn't it be awesome to see the speakers fluttering in the wind!

And, in my living room, I might get 5 small ones to hang from my ceiling fan.

I can't wait!

Unclear on the concept.

[blair1q]

If you could make speakers and enclosures out of lightweight materials, it would have been done long before now.

They're made out of 3/4th-inch plywood to take the stress of constant packing and unpacking.

I predict the first tour that tries to use these things will end up with what looks like the first all-duct-tape speaker enclosures by the end of the trip.

--Blair

Dammit... there they go again...

[Anonymous Coward]

those kids in their souped up hot-air balloon, flying all around the block, with their rap music blaring... You can hear the bass for miles...

There used to be a time when the sound those kids could make was limited to volume/carrying capacity of a honda civic.

What's my name, bitch?!

[Pope]

Flute, anyone?

Damn that Alyson Hannigan is sexy...

Bull Shit

[HEbGb]

I don't believe it for a minute.

Distortion down to 'unheard of low levels'? Hype city. There is absolutely no plausible mechanism to support this claim. As for transdcuer shapes, such as tetrahedral, it's almost completely irrelevant as far as sound quality goes.

Loudspeakers don't have a limited lifetime because of corrosion. It's usually fatigue of the constituent materials, of which an inflatable plastic would certainly be about the worst.

These might be a good gimmick, but nothing more. I think their egos need a bit of deflating.

They're apparently using NXT flat panel techniques. No wonder this is so full of mindless hype.

Hype city

[HEbGb]

I think it's time to deflate the hype surrounding these things a bit.

They basically use an inflatable structure (not unlike a beachball) as a loudspeaker enclosure, and attach a flat-panel loudspeaker to the front. Voila.

Performance of these will be questionable, at best, and they will certainly not have the performance they're claiming. Utter nonsense. They've provided absolutely nothing to support their claims.

Loudspeaker enclosured are designed to be rigid for a reason - they're essentially used as baffles and resonant structures, that, when properly designed, will provide a reliable, efficient, output of sound. An inflatable loudspeaker will not have any rigidity, thereby eliminating its use as a baffle, and severely diminishing low frequency performance. Second, the fact that the air will be expected to leak over time will change the resonant structure significantly, eliminating any possibility of consistent performance, if it even could be attained in the first place.

Now, an inflatable loudspeaker might be a nice gimmick, but it will absolutely not be a performance product. Not even close.

This is all hype, folks, nothing to see here - move along.

Oh, they're apparently VC funded? Go figure with the outlandish claims!

Dodecahedral speakers

[os2fan]

I recall reading in some book about "Design for the real world" about putting cheap speakers into the faces of a dodecahedron produces good sound. Nothing came of that, and I doubt if anything will come of this.

I think it has more to do with buyer perception than gee-whiz technology, although it could have some application for bands on the road or PA events.

Well...

[11thangel]

Just because they are LOUDspeakers doesn't mean they have to be QUALITY speakers. They just have to be LOUD.

But, but...

[Fear the Clam]

What will raveGrrrls stand on top of to dance? What will dweebBoyz jump from to crowd surf? My whole '90s world -- gone!

At least I'll always have my tribal tattoo.

What if they were inflated with water?

[torklugnutz]

In a multi bladder system, this seems like it would give good absorption of energy, and add structure and weight to the system, which would be useful in an outdoor/windy/explosion prone environment. The article doesn't mention that as part of their plan, but I wonder if it would be of any sonic benefit.

Man I want this

[mini me]

This would complement car audio nicely! No need to fill up your entire trunk with a sub box, just inflate when you need it and it will pack away nicely when you don't.

similar to inflatable guitars!

[guidobot]

There's actually already an inflatable acoustic guitar on the market, I've played it and it works very well. My ex-girlfriend was going to work for the guy making them, but the company is quite poor and couldn't afford to pay her. He was a real nice guy though, and had been trying to make one since 1979. Its based on the physics of an insect wing... there's quite a lot of information about it on the site mentioned above.

Anyways, don't discount the inflatable speakers as things that wouldn't work... these guitars worked really well. I saw them first in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts...

Ellula Sounds Ltd.

[frantzdb]

The article mentions Ellula Sounds Ltd. (not to be confused with EULA). A quick google search gives an article with a picture. See also Ellula's corporate page.

--Ben

Prior art

[Webmoth]

"...new technology that allows Inflatable Loud Speakers..."

I'm sorry, but this technology has been around for many years. It's called a "whoopee cushion." :-P

Re:Who needs this?

[A_Non_Moose]

OFFTOPIC? Who the hell is smoking crack?

GAH...How *freaking ON TOPIC* can a post be?

Shit, I should just change my name to 3M (Moronic Moderator Magnet) but it is taken.

Grrrr...man there is one __HUMOR IMPAIRED__ mother f**ker out there....

Ok, metamoderators...do your job, please. I know I do for moderators like this, who, would not know an on topic post if it bit them in the nads.

Has anyone thought of a way to aviod this kind of crap? Like if metamoderators judge 4 out of 5 *negative* moderations as unfair, flag the moderator as "clueless" or needs a smack or something?

"Who Needs a LOUDSPEAKER when we have SLASHDOT"

I thought it was pretty damn funny...*and* no one else said it? If I had been modded as redundant *and WAS* redundant...cool.

Moose.

Slightly paranoid, cause _someone_ IS out to get me. Tis the 2nd time an *ON TOPIC POST* has been modded down.

Ontopic, interesting, insightful flaimbait, yeah, that's me.

Maybe I should *drop* my +1 bonus when I type something funny? Heh, it work before... because I get the feeling the humor impaired with mod points browse at +2.

(SIGH) My own damn fault for thinking moderators *might* have a sense of humor...not so, but at least it helps me maintain my sense of irony.

Pheh.