Slashdot Mirror
Phone Plus Sensory Deprivation Equals...
Solo-Malee writes "The BBC has an article about a new phone technology that isolates the user from all other sensory input. This in theory means the user is not distracted by other things occurring in their immediate surroundings. If these catch on, it looks like getting a Jacuzzi for the office could be easier than you might expect."
[PET_PEEVE-2978741]
This in theory means the user is not distracted by other things occurring in their immediate surroundings.
For me the phone is a major distraction. When I'm busy I don't want a damn phone call from anyone. Unfortunately some people live by the phone; watch when a phone rings and see how people jump to answer it. Screw that: the phone is a convenient tool for me not a backdoor by which others can invade my space and privacy.
When I had a land-line at the house I didn't own an answering machine. Caller ID let me know who called and I could decide if a return call was warranted because once a message is left the onus is on you to call back. I have just my cell now and don't give out the number to non-friends & family. Take control of your life, the phone isn't your master.
[/PET_PEEVE-2978741]
Trolling is a art,
You don't want to be driving while using this phone...
Platform independent bug tracking software
Sounds like sex isn't going to be as much fun as before.
Why should the driver be bothered by my horn, or the wrecked bus of burning nuns?
mobile phone conversant drivers have new bouts of accidents while trying sensory deprivation in the aforementioned circumstances
Phone Plus Sensory Deprivation Equals...
MY JOB.
Unless they're filling the office pool with water, this sounds like something that missed its (.com) era.
I never vote for anyone. I always vote against.
-- W.C. Fields
Looks a lot like the "Cone of Silence" from Get Smart. Bet it works just as well. :)
...ability to drive?
And you thought people using mobile phones while driving NOW were dangerous.
fun.
The subject says it all...
I'm sorry..but this is so retarded I don't know where to begin.
Why? Ugh..god...
I want what they're smoking...
In Soviet Russia, the television watches YOU!
From the story.
That is, you can't smell anything else if the swimming pool isn't chlorinated.
Hmmm. No, I guess that wouldn't actually help much either
<sig>Guvf vf abg n frperg zrffntr
I heard they're licencing the Slashdot effect and applying it to Humans...
I'd buy this if it had some enhanced buffering features. Why not design some sort of real-time TiVo-like personal interface (LiVo?), with goggles and audio and all? That way, you could simply fast forward through conversations and encounters that are unenjoyable, boring, or repulsive. Isn't life too short to have to confront the mundane all of the time? Live personal LiVo secretaries could sift through the data and only bring us up to real-time when something/someone important happens. The rest of the time, we would be watching TeeVee, of course. With TiVo.
... to anyone who has ever seen people drive while talking on the phone...
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
This sounds like a bad idea ... It's annoying enough talking listening to people on the phone when I can distract myself by doing other things. Imagine if I cound't read Slashdot while users where telling me their life stories? How tedious would that be?! ;-)
The idea that people would actively get into
... noone calls me. And I go to no
a swimming pool and put on a helmet to answer
a work phone call. The mental image... is
quite worrying in some cases.
Though I find the best thing about working from
home is that people dont have my phone number
here, so
meetings. Magical.
Does it mean that you have to wear your swim clothes just to answer a phone call? Answering phones do not require that. Although I find it useful for air traffic controllers - they need concentration!
Now, some device like this to chill with a possibility of a soundtrack with erotic noises and some chick with breathing apparatus going at me ... I shudder to think where this is all coming from. Maybe it's because it's Friday afternoon.
Conversion Rate Optimisation French / English consultant
First of all, it would take a while for me to not be distracted using this "phone." How many of you are not in some way excited every time you get a new tech toy. I would be thinking more about the device, how it works, and the fact that I am in water, more than about the conversation. Your general conversations: "Dude! I'm floating in water while I talk! Isn't that cool?!"
"Men lie."
"Yeah, about sleeping with other women, but never about bioluminescent plankton."
-Dan Brown
Don't put this in your ass!
HELLO? I'M IN THE POOL!
On the plus side, it'll be easier to drown them...
It ignores novelties such as polyphonic ringtones and games and instead it is designed to help you concentrate on a phone call itself.
I'm sick of seeing all sorts of pointless features added to phones. The manufacturers know no bounds. This device isn't particularly useful, being as you need a swimming pool, but if it were made smaller, this could be something really useful when making important phone calls (when not driving, of course). I wish all the cell phone manufacturers would focus on making useful advancements such as this and better call clarity.
No one will pay attension to the road.
-- "To ask a question is to show ignorance; Not to ask a question means you'll remain ignorant."
Um, excuse me, but that's the problem with existing phones - the person concentrates only on the conversation, to the exclusion of everything else, including driving. If anything, we need a phone that would allow a person to do something else other than just talking. (And yes, I know about wireless headsets and I think they're great...)
The article doesn't really say how you would dial when you're immersed in complete sensory deprivation. I mean, your sense of sight, sound, and smell are supposedly completely removed by the device, and your body is supposed to be in body temperature water, getting rid of gravity and most of your touch. Wouldn't that make dialing a number difficult?
I suppose maybe you could only receive calls on the thing. But then, wouldn't it be impossible for two people to use them? If the point is to focus everything onto the conversation itself, if only one person has the experience, I imagine the person in the deprivation would be pretty pissed that the other person wasn't pay as much attention as they were.
Then again, this is a luxury item, and might only be available to executives for business calls. Perhaps they have their secretaries do all the dialing and then its just forwarded to the device, so they don't even have to worry about that aspect of it.
Ultimately, I think its impractical, though I'm glad that some people are doing truly innovative work. I give it a B for effort.
These pictures don't really give me the impression that this is very convenient. I get charged for both air-time and pool time? I take it that this is just a prototype, but let's be realistic, how is this going to work outside the lab setting?
Oh, and this contraption looks like something from that show Get Smart.. you remember "The Cone of Silence"?
How about a spell checker for slashdot, or even more impressive, a spell checker for strings in C-Code? Use lint! -DG
It's not April 15th, is it??
What more can be said?
There are 10 kinds of people; those who know ternary, those who don't, and those now hunting for a dictionary.
so... media lab europe is just as stupid and pointless as the original mit media lab. all buzzwords, no substance.
This sounds like enough to drive someone insane who has a condition like this. Heck, it would even make me a bit uncomfortable.
That and, of course, communicating with another human using voice instead of a computer.
If you are making a business call, you will probably want to refer to your notes.
This is not an easy task if you are wearing a darkened helmet in a swimming pool.
This is a tool of the Dark Side! It will seduce our business leaders and make them slaves to dark forces that only MBAs will understand!
Oh, wait...
Soko
"Depression is merely anger without enthusiasm." - Anonymous
Ok, who's getting fired at the BBC for accidently releasing next year's April Fool's story early?
-Ab
Nothing fails quite like prayer.
I work in telemarketing (well its classed as that, even though I wouldn't really call it that) and we have to actually listen out for background noises as a way of identify a persons interests. For example, a baby crying, a dog barking, Pearl Jam playing on the CD. Guess this will mean one less thing to think about when on the phone, sounds like a good idea!
*yawns* This is old stuff. I have a book here called "Shadow Run" from Fasa and it's all explained right here. I'm getting sick and tired of this site.
8 of 13 people found this answer helpful. Did you?
Your house is burning down, your kid cut his hand off, your husband is having a heart attack but your zoned out on your phone call to to vote for the next American Idol.
..There's a-dooin's a-transpirin'
... Do I have to wear tight red shorts to use it? That would be distracting as it is.
Looks like some R&D team has too much time on their hands.
This space for rent.
Around here, we keep the office pool filled with champagne.
...and tell me that this doesn't remind you vaguely of a popular movie series involving people that plug in and out of a virtual reality universe....
Rule #1 -- Politics always trumps technology.
Will this work in an iLoo? I know I could get some serious work done then.
Der Tod ist der einzige Weg hier raus!
Brilliant, now all they need to do is shrink it down so it can fit in my pocket.
Seriously, these guys get paid to come up with rubish like this? Anyone who can't concentrate on, say, a phone call and cooking probably doesn't know how to work a phone, let alone make a call.
Yet another case of coming up with a device and then trying to justify it.
I am NaN
It's called the automobile.....
love is just extroverted narcissism
This just in, College Frat-houses have banded together and signed a deal with Cingular. Cingular will now provide sensory deprivation mobile phones, free of charge, to all female students on approximately 70% of the American campuses. This of course means that the drop off rate for female students will climb through the roof as the pregnancy occurences for freshman females grows.
"Sheep just follow the easiest path and run from scary noises and intimidating creatures." - Me
hm, I dont have the attention span or caring to devote time to a phone call, locking my door and spending quality time with loved ones. I guess I will buy a sensory deprivation phone so that my ADD (read American upbringing) wont interfere with the quality time I am not willing to put effort into.
After all, a phone is not enough to converse, but with a helmet, all things things are possible. I mean... its a helmet.
"this is the gloaming"
radiohead
Sounds great - except for the phone.
..." (someone's probably said this by now, let me check ...)
When I tried a sensory deprivation tank (no phone, just epsom salts thanks), it was a big egg-shaped tank without any lights. Afterwards my date and I got totally engrossed in cutlery at the restaurant. We were swimming in over-perception. The effect waned over a few days.
Guess with this one you could get your computer to phone you and play "Echoes" by Pink Floyd, or just shut the phone off.
Anyone know any good sensory deprivation music? Polly would need a hi-fi phone though...
BTW I'm experimenting with browsing at -4 funny, o/w my comment would have been something like "Looks like the woman's phone has 5 spheres not 3. Oh wait
Esteem isn't a zero sum game
I don't know about you guys, but this thing would have to be very good to keep me from noticing the chick in the black bikini in the background...
Worst...invention...ever.
-B
Why is this in the "related links" section?
"Compare the best prices on: Consumer Electronics"
Which forwards you to osdn.pricegrabber.com?
Is tricking people into generating those $0.00001 referral clicks is the new business model? Not selling enough subscriptions?
What's the deal?
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
...to really help me concentrate on masturbating! And makes for easy cleanup!
Just look at the cell phone users who drive!
Use your imagination and try to think for a second. I assure you it's refreshing.
If you can answer the "Why?" then it's not the dumbest thing I've ever seen. But I don't think you can.
So far nobody has. Total focus on the phone call? Who needs a swimming pool and that hidous helmet for that? If you can't focus as is, you got real problems.
In Soviet Russia, the television watches YOU!
I don't know about you, but I sure don't want to have someone in the car in front of me removed from all sensory stimulation during the morning commute!
"Terminate?"
"Terminate... with extreme prejudice"
I bet some fool will get it for his car...
"Yeah, officer, I was driving down the highway at 65mph when my phone rang. I have no idea how I ended up in this field! And why is the front of my car all covered in blood?"
There's a growing sense that even if The Future comes,
most of us won't be able to afford it.
-- Lemmy
Imagine running and jumping into the pool, strapping on your Lunar Lander floating headset, and getting all situated, just to find a telemarketer on the other end of the line!
I don't know what's worse, that you have to get out and dry off, or that the telemarketer has your TOTAL ATTENTION.
Slashdot Syndrome: the sudden, extreme urge to correct someone in order to validate one's self.
I'm struggling on a logical application on this one. The only thing I can think of is the super duper isophonesex lines. You can really focus in on the caller breathing heavy as you masturbate in a luke warm pool. It's an experence, and probally legal in most civilized countries.
There is no sanctuary. There is no sanctuary. SHUT UP! There is no shut up. There is no shut up.
when did gravity become a distraction?
a Slashdot story that has pictures of a woman in a bikini!
Honk if you're horny.
One of the things I really like doing in bed (lame replies welcome) is listening to music with excellent earphones (Sony MDR-EX51LP Fontopia). The deprivation of other senses at night (floating on the matress, pitch dark, no other sounds) lets you fully grasp the details in the music. Beats listening to a stupid phone.
Flourescent (adj): smelling like ground wheat.
My brother works at a call centre and they are always being lectured on how they have to pay attention and stay focused on the customer.
I can see it now, every call centre gets rid of the cubicles and installs giant swimming pools, people leaving work looking like giant raisins. They wouldn't even have to leave their phone to take a pee, as long as the water doesn't contain the stuff that turns purple if someone pees.
[SIG] Far better to be thought a fool then to post on
People with too much time on their hands invent incredibly impractical device for easily distracted people who probably will never use it anyway.
"The Sage treasures Unity and measures all things by it" - Lao Tzu
AAAAAAAARGH not again
*takes off clothes*
*puts on helmet*
*dives into water*
Hi, we have this great new vacuum cleaner we're selling
Computer says that it is September 12, but reading this article, I am sure that it is April 1.
Lasers Controlled Games!
That's all we need - a mobile using mech user, completely oblivious while his Atlas crushes four grocery stores an a kindergarten beneath its feet.
Because you are a delicate genius who is called upon to solve prolems of global import, and need 100% focus upon the problem at hand, else countless lives may be at stake.
Like me. I get those calls all the time and it's hard to negotiate peace in the middle east and solve the energy crisis with the TV blaring and some kid pulling my pantleg asking if he can have some Oreos a half hour before dinner.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
Because that already happens with most of the phone-equipped drivers I see during the day...
"Oh my God. This is terrible. This is the end of my Presidency. I'm fucked."; ~ Donald J. Trump
As if those damn drivers on cell phones weren't bad enough...
Like it wasn't bad enough working for one already.... "Alright, everyone in the pool!"
SIG: HUP
Is there a suck-air-out option?
THAT would be a cool technology!!!
MMMmmmmmm....erotic cakes!!! Homer J. Simpson - Treehouse of Horror VI
Hmm...
I was wrong. There IS a use for these things.
We'll put GWBush and whatever other idiots we can find in these things, toss them in a pool... and NEVER EVER call them.
In Soviet Russia, the television watches YOU!
I could really use one of these while I'm driving.
I find I'm often distracted by what other cars are doing, and trying to hold a conversation while monitoring my speed and dealing with traffic lights, stop signs, and cray drivers is a real pain.
---------------------------------------------
SERENITY NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
First of all we have The Tyranny of E-mail, which complained about how it broke your concentration. Now it's a good thing that your communication method forces you to forget absolutely everything else?
More seriously, if people were that worried about the call, they could find a way to focus. If you're outside, find somewhere out of the way, or a phonebooth, either works. If you're inside, why are distractions a problem? If I'm not completely focused on call, it's because something in real life is more important/interesting!
by America's top intelligence agencies. See here.
If your bitterest enemies are people who hack the heads off civilians, then I would say you're doing something right.
I could see people talking on their cell phone and driving with one of these. Talking about a disaster. People can't drive now...
Finally, I never seem to be able to concentrate with all this gravity around!
I can't believe that this is getting coverage, what a stupid 1st year community art college dropout idea.
This has by far some better design ideas
http://design-engine.com
What's pragmatic about having to dive in a pool to make a phone call?
I hadn't the slightest objection to his spending his time planning massacres for the bourgeoisie... (P.G. Wodehouse)
It's a bit silly as a phone, but without dialing anybody it might make a pretty good sensory deprivation tank. I enjoy "tanking" on occassion in a John-Lilly-style tank, but the biggest problem I've found is with the Epsom salts (that stuff is nasty if it gets in your eyes). Has anybody here tried a tank that works like the one in the story? It doesn't look as comfortable as lying down, but it does do without the salts.
Jason
If you don't want to be disturbed by external sounds, why don't you just use ear protection together with ear plugs?
The floating in water thing is just over the top.
OOH, I hope so! That would be just swell!
For your security, this post has been encrypted with ROT-13, twice.
Q. What am I if I have a jelly in one ear and custard in the other?
A. A trifle deaf.
*ducks*
Stick Men
This thing sounds great.
Except they'd first have to work on the 0.3-4kHz bandpass filter regular phones have, to get that "natural conversation feel" going. Oh, and stereo wouldn't be bad, either.
OK, so it's a silly idea after all.
Comments:
Anyone else dig the way they so obviously used a silver-sprayed motorcycle helmet? "It looks cool, kind of futury".
No dear, it doesn't. It looks like crap.
2: Quote: "We will have to see if the Isophone is worth the trouble. In the meantime it will just drift in a sea of ideas."
That was very, very funny.
Oh, if we only had that wit in every single thing we ever read, heard, or saw. Can you imagine?
yes, we have no bananas
Its for call centers, stupid.
As an added benefit, you can power the predictive dialers using these phones combined with a form of fusion.
-1 Uncomfortable Truth
so now i have to run upstairs, strip down to a swimsuit, jump in the pool and get the headgear on all in the 4 rings before it goes to voicemail?
!(^((ri)|(mp))aa$)
The first thing I thought on seeing the setup was 'That'd be great for virtual reality'.
:)
There's resistance and freedom of motion for simulating a variety of environments. Augmented with, say, a servo-assisted suit for resistance variables.
Pipe whatever into the helmet and away you go...or not, in this case. Imagine all those UT2K3-VR[tm] gamers thrashing around in a pool
Might be worth employing some sort of anchor, too.
If this is anything like the "Cone of Silence" from the old TV series "Get Smart", I'm sure lots of people will buy it for their bosses :) (The cone of silence was a pair of bubbles that came down over two people's heads so they could block outside sound while talking. It worked so well, the two people couldn't talk to each other, either)
Now all I need is a shoe phone from Nokia - the N-Shoe!
...is a phone that keeps other people from hearing your conversations. It's really annoying when you're sitting next to someone on the commuter rail, and they insist on spending the entire trip gabbing to no particular end at about 10dB higher than they need to.
An acceptable alternative would be to designate one car as a "cellphone car," and let the rest of us read in peace.
[ home ]
so, ye' old /. editor thinks jacuzzi in the office. Why was the only thing that popped into my head was the Cone of Silence(tm)?
but it does mess with my sensory input.. why does slashdot a a single white pixel at the bottom center of their top ad banner. Every time I see it I think I have to clean my screen.
DK
Get Smart was prohetic to say the least! Would you believe this much?
send the researchers of this *great* piece of technology to the moon?
Problem solved (if there is no air, there is no sound to distract you), and no need to spend *a lot* of money on crap projects...
Let's face it... they have a big market. They only need to find ppl that:
1 - Want to travel with a phone the size of a elephant. (to avoid unnecessary replies: the big gray ones from Africa, not the small ones from India)
2 - Work inside a pool.
3 - Need to have a conversation while in the pool.
4 - Need a brain surgery because they can't concentrate on a stupid phone call.
A ***HUGE*** market I must admit.
Could this be as close to a "brain-cluster" as possible?
,Bill" "Jane, how about.., Jane".. when I say Jane, she gets my next statement, but Bill can't hear it.
You set 10 people together to discuss an idea or problem in a conference call mode, let them figure out a protocol.. Or, each person is patched into three other "mind-nodes", auditory only, and must precede all communications with a command. The voice packets are then sen to the appropriate node
"Bill, what if...
Course, what happens when people start hallucinating from the sensory dep?
meh
Sounds like they grabbed the idea right out of EFC (Earth Final Conflict). Sendep was used as a form of criminal punishment. Now, we take that idea, and make people focus on the conversation.
Even the inventor's name, James Auger, is straight from EFC (Auger was put into sendep)...
Coincidence?
in a tech support Matrix.
I hearby sentence the inventors to "death by their own product." We're going to put them in one of these things for 12 hours a day. . . then unlist their phone number.
Won't do much for them but it'll nicely isolate us from whatever further sensory input they might unleash upon us.
KFG
...20 car pile-up.
-JT
This researcher should be celebrated - he figured out how to do "research" involving girls in bikinis. Brilliant.
Yeah I am sure these will catch on. Not only that it should be a big boost to the pool industry. Don't worry about the fact that in many areas you will only be able to use your phone during the summer months. Hmmm, I can just see it now... "well, I am not going to call my mother/sister/brother during the winter, because I know she/she/he will not be paying attention to me.
Just some random thoughts:
Everytime I get in the pool I always have to pee, which would be a distraction in itself.
Other people would probably be swiming in the pool, there is nothing more irritating to me then someone splashing me while I am in the pool.
Do you have to sit in the pool all day waiting for a call, or do you answer a call and ask the person to hold while you put your bathing suit on.
What if there is an electrical storm while you are on the phone? You would not know and could die.
Do you think the ring tone should be the theme to Jaws?
Lets take the whole point of mobile phones - that you can use them anywhere - and destroy it...What rocket scientists were behind this one?
Similarly, I absolutely need to drive while drinking a fifth of Jack Daniels. But try telling that to the cops, sheesh!
Who the heck paid for this? Can I have some money for my "Sensory Deprivation, I want some money" idea? I mean, am I the only one that is kind of hoping this is a joke?
Well, it should atleast eliminate the distraction of an in-call bathroom brake...
eww.
Smoke me a kipper, I'll be back for breakfast.
You just know that if Linux was involved in any way, shape or form with this device, hordes of slashdotters would be proclaiming it the greatest invention ever!
"Information wants to be paid"
The one in Dune worked properly. And wasn't all that portable. (I don't think it was Dune 1, though. Possibly Dune Messiah.)
In all events, the general concept has shown up in several places. It's basically a high-tech phone booth with a closing door. Usuall big enough to allow a few people simultaneous occupancy, and usually without visible (or very visible) boundries. The first time I encountered it was in 1940's Science Fiction. Something by A.E. van Vogt I think.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
I noticed what might be construed as a minor implediment to adoption and implementation in that YoU HaVE To bE StAnDInG StILL In A %$#% SwIMMING PoOL WiTH FoUR BLaSTED UgLY PLaSTIC PoDS ARoUND YoUR NoGGIN To MaKE A SImPLE STInKING PHoNE CaLL!
Ahem.
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
Can't be for call centers. How do the mindless drones take down my credit card info when they can't see?
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
I don't know about you, but they seem to expect a low level of cognitive ability if you can be distracted by gravity. In fact, I would argue that the distraction of having to breath is greater than that of gravity. Having said that, the device might be also designed to releive you of the necessity for breating also, resulting in a very profound sense of peace.
Is it just me or does this seem like some insidious tool for brainwashign someone. I'm mean think about it...being cut off from all sensations except...that voice.
From the article: The device is a Media Lab Europe project which goes against the grain of mobile development.
Against the grain? I'll say! Cuz we all know how portable a POOL is.
I also bet that they got some sort of grant money for this as well.
Do they expect to be taken seriously with this work? I fully expect the only user of this thing to be Austin Powers, with a bunch of sharks with fricken lasers on their heads swimming around him.
Hell, this is even too stupid for Get Smart... and he had the "Cones of Silence".
Even after my second cup of coffee, this just doesn't make sense... it belongs on the Onion more than the BBC.
*sigh*
$0.02 (CDN)
2. Approach phone user silently w/ hand in bag.
3. Remove hand from bag and place on selected part of anatomy.
We all know how distracting gravity can be!
Some schmuck out there will by this along with his 10,000 dollar gold shower curtain. Reminds me a little of minority report and the folks floating in the pool. But it's still dumb.
Could someone get me the isophone number of that girl in the pictures from the article? I'd love to have an in-depth conversation with her. ;-)
If you click on the Research & Development link at the bottom of this page, you can see a movie and some more info about the IsoPhone!
I live to gib...
Nobody would voluntarily get in the swimming pool to make a call. This is aversion therapy for people who use cell phones in public places.
Now if only the telemarketers could get one of these to drop down out of the sky every time they called me ...
Would there be a function where you could get interrupted, I don't mean like call waiting, bujt say that you were sitting in your cube and your buddies wanted to go out to lunch but you were on the phone with some idiot. I mean, it sounds like ka nice idea, but I don't really find that things around are distracting from phbone conversations unless the conversation is terribly boring, or it's with someone I dislike.
Which would mean that if these devices were used to aid my attentnion in such a situation it would essentially become an instrument of torture.
A very important trend in Human-Computer Interaction is to create devices that are of dubious practical value, but tell us a lot about the needs/wants/feelings of society. Basically, this device allows people to really think about what they want out a cellphone conversation, to tell stories about themselves, and what telephones mean to them. These stories then go into making real devices with features people *really* need, instead of those that engineers *think* people need.
The article clearly didn't make this clear enough, and even made it sound like they were planning to sell the device. I highly doubt that's the case (the story about the business man in Japan is exactly that - a story about someone with a particular need that may not be met by current technology).
I also suspect this is the fault of the reporter, not the researchers, as the reporter just wanted to make a funny/weird sounding story, and probably missed a lot of what the researchers were saying.
Or Rammstein (Which is off the other end of the scale)
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Do they realize the market for this is saturated? It's called soccer moms in rush hour on cellphones. They already have no cognizance of their surroundings!
It doesn't matter what you wrap your emotions around, Reality is a brick wall specifically designed to scramble eggs
why do we have these lame stories today?
"... isolates the user from all other sensory input. This in theory means the user is not distracted by other things occurring in their immediate surroundings..." Instead of protecting cell phone users from outside distractions, I want cell phone users to have something that stops them from distracting/annoying others. Maybe we need a portable maxwell-smart-like cone-of-silence that cell-phone users can use when they just *have* to have that (non-) private, loud conversation in a restaurant or other public place... Perhaps a nice big sound-deadening bag. Put it over their head while they make the call. ;-)
Do you want to see the buildings around you? OK, but you have to pay the architecht's IP, otherwise you are stealing, profiting from someone else's work. Architechts deserve a decent earning, don't they?
Do you want to see the beautiful girl just in front of you? No problem, just pay the fee to the stylist that designed her dress and that contributed her nice appearence.
A new version of DMCA will rule out all tentative of scaping from these cells as an atempt to violate copyright holders' propriety.
Freedom activists will defend the right to escape from the cells for 1 or 2 reasons they can figure out that still don't infringe copyrights, while others will argue that most of us trying to escape from cells are actually really just willing to break copyrights.
I guess the sensory deprivation would be a bummer if you tried to have phone sex. Shame - could be kinda kinky in the pool.
Never pet a burning dog.
I do tech support, and I would love one of these in our noisy call center!
Phone Plus Sensory Deprivation Equals...
- Bad Spelling -
Lots of people think the phone is a convenience item for them, not to allow other people to reach you. well what about the phone number you're dialing? do they feel the same way as you? then aren't you just as bad as that big bad person calling you? In my previous job I hated people like that, who would never pick up the phone until I called 10 times, instead choosing to verbally abuse me after they finally pick up,without knowing why i was calling, or who I was. Dispite the fact that I was calling back to solve a problem they were having with their computer, calling back to solve it any way possible. the caller ID didn't say who i was, Just which line I was calling out of, it didn't even have my proper line. Answering machines are better, then I can leave a message. but the people who only use caller ID are very arrogant. what if the number was that of a hospital which didn't come up as "hospital" but just as a number you didn't know. Would you ignore it? dispite the fact that they are attempting to contact you about, for example, your child, your parent, your sibling, your spouse. The phone is a two way street. like it or lump it, it is a two way street.
There is no way a broad is going to put up with his crap.
Can't you just see Nelson Muntz having a field day? What a haul of geek's swim suits he would have!
--
"Outlook not so good." That magic 8-ball knows everything! I'll ask about Exchange Server next.
... of Darwinism at work.
It's nothing but crumpled porno and Ayn Rand.
When there are computers beeping, phones ringing, and people yelling it's very hard to focus on your phone sex--- errr.. important business call. Yes. Ahem.
Escape Pod Films: Sketch Comedy and Web Series
...someone still has the money to develop this. This is without a doubt the dumbest thing I have ever seen in my entire life. Whoever wasted money on developing this is an idiot...although smoehow I have the feeling that someone else will be dumb enough to buy it. Completely pointless...black goggles and a headset will do the same thing. Why do you need to be isolated from physical input while on the phone....sosososososososososososo stupid.
What limits are there to non-sense?
Are you saying that cell phones used in cars *don't* do this now? As a motorcyclist, I decided years ago that was the only explantion for cell phone drivers.
But... this would imply they're all simply idiots!
You turn ONE LITTLE bus full of nuns into burning wreckage and that's all everyone talks about. "Hey AL! How many hail Marys did ya get?"
Now I have a reason to get a hot tub for my office, and write it off as a business expense!
The sweet lords of slackerdom have smiled upon me yet again.
have some imagination buddy!
I see the ultimate masturbatorium for phone sex there.lol
*Repent!Quit Your Job!Slack Off!The World Ends Tomorrow and You May Die!
Forget about phone calls.
It looks like this may be more useful for insomniacs.
Great, now instead of outsourcing all of our call centers overseas they will outsource them in-the-seas!
It's a good thing the world sucks or we'd all fall off.
Pah, we already have that. Its called a Car Phone.
this doesn't look like a positive development, but more like a government showing off its dark side with a light article. kind of like the USA showing the underground satelite map of the Nile delta to rattle soviet chains.
"You never want a serious crisis to go to waste." - Rahm Emanuel
a new phone technology that isolates the user from all other sensory input
You mean like... a PHONE BOOTH?
Are you sure this article wasnt written for The Onion?
Hmmmmmmm.....bacon.....canadian bacon.....mexican bacon!
Yes, let's see....plugged in, unaware of the outside world. Hmmmm. Art does precede life, I guess.
How can I get one of these put into my car so I can use it while driving?
You shound exactly like one of my stupid friends. He has no caller ID, never checks his answering machine and never answers his phone...ever.
Can I call him to tell him to turn on the news quick because his dad is on live tv? Can I call him and tell him store A has one copy of that piece of software he wants left for $200 off? When he doesn't get wind of these sort of things quick enough, he bitches like crazy...but always he returns to his foolish thought that the phone is soley a convenient tool for him, never the other way around.
So how long until people will be driving around with these things on their head oblivious to other vehicles on the road?
Normal cell phones are banned, can I get one of these??
to find a practical use for this 'invention'. I think someone really needs to find something better to do with his time. Sensory deprivation+Mobile phone? Hang on a minute, I'm going to take this call in my sensory deprivation tank. What is an 'in depth' phone call? If I want to spend a lot of money to have an 'in depth conversation', I'll use a video phone. I think this comes from the long line of ideas that starts with:
1. Anything
2. Mobile Phone + Anything
3. Profit!!!
TallGreen CMS hosting
Phone Plus Sensory Deprivation Equal = most people with PhDs = no practical experience
This isn't a technological advance, it's... art! Yes! The complete impracticality (not to mention redundancy) of an underwater sense-dep telephone is a brilliant, scathing critique of the techno-scientifically induced phenomenon that Husserl called 'activity in passivity'. It is not until our culture rediscovers the underlying crisis in the Western project --- that instrumental advances alter and, yes, perhaps even narrow, the horizon of subjective existence --- that we will fully understand the work of this visionary.
Either that, or he's a government-funded british crackpot inventor who happens to like tanks, and telephones, and decided to put the two together. You decide.
- undoware.ca
It might just be a trick of light and shadow, but the guy from the picture in the article seems very excited about this technology.
I think it was in the first Dune because as far as I can recall it was mentioned in an arena, used by Devries and Fenring to converse while Harkonnen was watching Feyd battle some people. Only Fenring survives of that bunch to go on to Dune Messiah... but I might be wrong who was there.
When I read it, I could only think about Get Smart.
We learned to drive with our knees from watching our pastor do it when we had to go serve mass at the local convalescent homes - he was good - could light his pipe while taking corners at high (to a fifth grader) speed steering with his knees.
I consider it a valuable skill and it was passed down from someone of great social and moral authority. I'll stop doing it when you pry my steering wheel from my cold dead knees!
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
We didn't have reliable caller ID at the time, so I had to guess who it was based on what I could hear, which sometimes wasn't very enlightening, and was sometimes quite interesting.
I'm sure he does this to other random people in his address book.
I hope one wouldn't be able to dial the isophone accidentally.
you worthless monkey
Nothing better than complete sensory deprivation (even cutting of the sense of gravity) when taking a large amount of LSD/psilocybin mushrooms/DMT/etc. For those who wish to experience an amazing 'inner journey' - this would be perfect. Your mind's imagination will be the only thing that will feed the sensory parts of the brain.
Now for THAT use, I can *definitly* see a small market. For proof of concept, we can take a look at Alex Grey's Mindfold. Even good old George Bush owns one!
That could be used for the world's best (albeit most expensive) phone sex ...
(pervert voice)
Do you know who this is? I sure know who you are. Guess what? I got naked and strapped myself in a nomex diving suit, put on a life support helmet and submerged myself in warm saline just so I could be totally and completely alone with your voice. How do you like that? ssssssssssss....
(/pervert voice)
why I don't get a paid subscription to /.
Bah!
Who wants to use the pool after me?
The little voices told me to stay@home & clean the guns.
wtf? this is research? jesus here we are in a f-ing recession and imbeciles are using real $$ to develop dumbass stuff like this.
Next you'll hear we are going to the moon again..oh i guess we are..
oh, forgot to add..
GEORGE BUSH IS A FASCIST PIG AND HIS CRONIES CAN SUCK MY COCK
POLO!
Finally, the Precogs in Minority Report can spookily yap on the phone to one another between dreams. "Yer crazy! The killer had on a white shirt. Ecru, my ass."
"A great democracy must be progressive or it will soon cease to be a great democracy." --Theodore Roosevelt
Whole huge banks of telemarketers and operators in these things, corporate policy, you know? Filtration systems mean no time lost due to bathroom breaks, benzadrine in the pool water to keep the operators sharp & keeps them from needing to eat for 18 hours at a stretch, hooked up to all kinds of scary medical monitors. A lot of companies already use prison labor to answer their phones, would it be much of a stretch to require prisoners to use these?
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
A more optimal solution would have been:
40 PRINT "Yeah."
50 PRINT "So..."
60 GOTO 40
Yeah, I can HARDLY WAIT for them to incorporate this same concept (of course in a different form) into cellphones that jackass people can use while driving! As if they aren't dangerous enough already, yeah: let's completely isolate them from the inputs they might use to drive without being a public hazard....
I want my CyberDeck. I wanna 'jack-in' dammit !!!
*wannabe cowboy dreaming about the Matrix/Cyberspace*
*should start calling Gibson to complain*
Oh why, why did I believe him ???
Is the only real use for this.
I mean what other kind of phone call would you want to devote your complete and undivided attention to?
I suppose calls to one's SO would be another use. But any call to my SO I want to give that much attention to is bordering on phone sex anyway.
Happy Fun Ball is for external use only.
That's not new. Teenaged girls have been doing this for decades.