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"Smart" Billboards Debut in Sacramento
k0osh.CEOofCLIT writes "Remember the billboards in "Minority Report" that scanned your eyes and changed the advertisement based on your shopping preferences? The Sacramento Bee reports: "Soon, this sign along the Capital City Freeway will be able to change its message based on what radio stations motorists have tuned in.""Yeah, Chris can't spell. He and Rob should form a club. *grin*
I haven't seen it yet, you insensitive clod!
"All art is quite useless." -- Oscar Wilde
What I listen to in my car is nobody else's business. Anyone know how I can go about installing shielding around my radio?
Soon, the billboards will be giving us advice ala LA Story. "I think you would be happy if you bought a Gap Denim Jacket!"
Considering the type of "music" I listen to, people will be treated with some good porn when I drive by. Too bad for all the traffic accidents that will follow, though...
Speeling machines anyone?
i think wrapping your entire car with tinfoil and chickenwire may do the trick. then again, that might possibly amplify your signal :-/
seriously, what's it show when you're not listening to a radio? or, even more interesting, what happens when i'm tuned into those sex-talk shows that come on after midnight. that has the potential to cause quite a few accidents!
I only listen to NPR, what are they going to sell me? A platter of dead tree? Hah!
Bored with karma, be a fan/freak
"here's no passive way to do this at all"
They have mirrors with strings strategically placed around the vicinity of the billboard/freeway.
When a car drives past a camera detects the cars velocity and starts adjusting the mirrors untill one of them can peek through your windscreen and see where the dial is set.
I wonder if it works for vehicles with no read/side windows ?
...for a different reason. I've driven by the one that went up in 1999 a few times, and every time I wonder "How schweet would it be to play Quake 3 on that?"
What do you expect from a guy whose handle is "k0osh.CEOofCLIT"?
I can't tell you exactly how this thing is supposed to work (the atricle doesn't have enough information) but I can give you some ideas:
Expample one:
Radar detector detectors. These work by detection the frequency emitted by the local oscillator inside certain radar dectectors. The workaround wich followed was for radar detector manufacturers to simple change their LO frequencies.
Example two:
Store anti-shoplifting mechanisms. Those little tags that they put on just about everything these days are actually small electric circuits tuned to resonate at a specfic radio frequency. when you walk though the entrance/exit of the store, you walk between at a transmitter and a receiver. The tx/rx transmits at two radio frequencies. One is the frequency of the tags and one isn't. When a person walks through the gate, the amplitude of both frequencies at the reciever drops. If a tag passes through the gate, the one frequency is going to drop in amplitude more than the other, because of the resonance of the tag. Shoplifter nailed.
Something similar to either one of these methods might be usable, but I can't tell you which one as the article doesn't give this type of information.
Life is too short to proofread.
"Hi! It looks like you're using your PDA, would you like some help?"
"Hi! It looks like you're trying to listen to the radio, would you like
a. A step-by-step guide on listening to your radio.
b. A radio tutorial.
c. Continue using the radio.
And voila, radio dropouts every few minutes on all highways!
What makes a man want to be a mouse? (Python's Flying Circus)
A guy who listens to death metal would get a funeral home ad...
So put ads on road-signs.
Speed
55
Coke
is
it
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Your comment violated the "postercomment" compression filter. Try less whitespace and/or less repetition. Comment aborted.
Damn, and I thought the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show jumbo-tron billboard on the Gardner Expressway in Toronto was distracting! Oh, wait a sec, these new billboards won't beat that. ;-)
[the doorbell rings]
Mike: That'll be the front door.
Neil: I bet I know who's got to answer it.
Mike: But, Neil - you like meeting people!
Neil (to camera): If I had a penny for everytime I had to answer the door, I'd have five pound sixty three!
[Neil gets up and goes to door]
Vyvyan: It's probably someone unbelievably boring!
Neil: Oh, no! It's the TV Detector Van!
Rik:MIKE, YOU BASTARD! Why didn't you buy a licence? I can't go to prison! I'm too pretty! I'll get raped!
Mike: Yeah, steady on! Steady on! We're not beat yet! All right, the time has come for diplomacy!
Neil: Oh, no - he's asked me if we've got a telly! I think I'm gonna have to lie! Bad Karma!
Mike: All right - the time for diplomacy is over. Vyv?
[Mike unplugs the TV]
Mike: Chuck the telly out the window!
Rik: Get rid of it! Quickly! Quickly!
[Vyvyan picks up TV and throws it at the window. The TV bounces off the window]
Mike (to camera): That, I did not expect!
Vyvyan: What if we sneak it out past him into the street?
Rick (to Mike): Yes! Yes! Yes! Mike, you go out and point to the sky, right, and say, 'Look at that interesting thing up there!'
Rick (to Vyvyan): You disguise the TV as an old woman, and sneak it past him!
Mike: Rick, suicide may be a great hobby - but I wouldn't do it for a living!
Neil: Lads, I've told him we don't have a telly, and I think that's thrown him a bit - but it won't hold him forever!
Rik: Good thinking, Neil! Keep it up!
[Rick starts writing in a notebook]
Mike: This is a very tricky spot, but Mike - the cool person - will squeeze it! Rick, stop crying!
[Rick rubs his eye]
Rik: I'm not crying - I just got something in my eye, that's all!
Mike: Vyv? Eat the telly!
Vyvyan: That's a completely brilliant idea, Mike! I've been wanting to do this for a long time!
[Vyvyan grabs the TV and starts devouring it. Rick continues writing]
Rick (writing aloud to himself): (It was the other three, not me. I had no idea what was going on, it really was the other three!)
[cut to front door. Neil is talking to a man]
Neil: All right, don't rush me - that's not an easy question to answer. 'Have I got a telly?' There could be, like, a number of different replies. I need some time to think one up, you know?
Mr Bastard: We know you've got one - we detected it!
Neil: Oh - so you've just been playing with me all along?
Mr Bastard: Well, it's better than playing with yourself! Ho-ho! A cheap sexual allusion - makes the world go round!
Neil: Ugh!
Mike: Neil, you haven't introduced me to your new pal.
Mr Bastard: Bastard's the name!
[he shakes Mike's hand]
Mr Bastard: But you can call me 'Right Bleeding' - all my friends do. Or did.
Mike: What do you mean?
Mr Bastard: I killed him. Where's your licence?
Mike: As the eunuch said to Mussolini, 'I haven't got one - and if I did, I wouldn't show it to you!'
Neil: That was a really cheap joke, Mike.
Mike: I'm saving up to pay the licence fine.
Neil: Don't tell me you haven't got a plan.
Mike: (I could never resist a challenge.) Neil, I haven't got a plan.
Mike (to camera): I hope someone's taking this down!
[Mr Bastard shoves his way inside the house]
Mr Bastard: Right - where's this telly? Ah-hah! So you do have it! You little runt!
[he walks over to Vyvyan, who has successfully eaten the TV, save for the cord, which hangs out his mouth. Vyvyan waves to Mr Bastard]
Mr Bastard: The old trick, eh? Eat the telly before I get a chance to nick you!
Vyvyan: It's a toaster!
Mr Bastard: It's a telly, you yobbo! Now give it back - I want to nick you!
[he grabs Vyvyan's hands, puts his foot on Vyvyan's stomach and pulls. Mike quickly intervenes]
Mike: Mr Bastard! Mr Bastard! OKAY! Now, toaster or telly, the contents of my colleague's stomach are private property! And if they get damaged in any way, we sue!
Mr Bastard: Well... I can wait! I've dealt with your sort before!
Mr Bastard (to Neil): Where's your toilet?
Neil: Oh, upstairs. Just follow your nose.
Rik: That's just great, Neil. Tell the fascist where our toilet is!
Neil: Shh!
Mr Bastard: I'm going up there now, to wait. I know how to wait! And I promise you, son - when that telly comes out the other end, you're nicked!
[he slowly slinks up the stairs, then comes back and looks at the bomb for a second, the ascends the stairs again]
Vyvyan: It's all right, lads - I always poo before I get up!
----- One piece short of Legoland
Because, as everyone knows, driving down the highway without reading all the billboards is stealing.
Kind thoughts do not change the world
Just do what I do when you're driving down the road and you see a billboard, close your eyes! This way, the advertising won't influence you.
For some reason, a few seconds after I close my eyes, people start honking their horns. I haven't exactly figured out this correlation.
In certain parts of the city there are so many billboards that I just keep my eyes closed for the entire drive.
Geoffeg
I'm sure you can tell what I'm getting at: in order to receive frequency RF, one must generate frequency IF [bldrdoc.gov] via local oscillations (LO), and IF directly corresponds to RF. Stephen Wolfram points out [wolfram.com] the relationship V[IF] = V[RF] + V[LO] for increasing and V[IF] = V[RF] - V[LO] for decreasing. Armed with this formula and decent knowledge of the radio's tank circuit, it is trivial to pick up the LO and IF frequencies your car radio transmits, albiet inadvertedly, and customize the billboard contents accordingly
Hmmm...
So this array 'V', that holds all these values, where is it initialized??
I mean if I can get hold of the source code to my radio, I can easily change the IF variable (#define or whatever).
Looks pretty easy, but then I'm sure these "smart billboard" people didn't expect they'd be dealing with a C programmer.
I hope it isn't written in Java - that would explain why my channel seek moves so slowly.
So does that mean the billboard will go out when I drive by listening to CDs?