Ladies and Gentlemen, the Electronic Toilet

BlueCup writes "The bathroom has been one of the few places people frequent where digital technology hasn't taken over. Most people use toilets more often than iPods, yet the humble American commode has remained as low tech as things get, essentially a combination of pipes, levers and flaps. Computers are now invading the bathroom. For several years, manufacturers have been quietly pushing toilets and toilet seats costing $1,000 or more that use small, built-in computers and remote controls to add new features that warm, wash and dry you. As bathrooms become more upscale and luxurious, a digital toilet fits right in."

Comments

Asinine

[BWJones]

Jeeeez, talk about flushing money down the drain....... :-)

Seriously though, there are some things whose design has absolutely been optimized to a point where it would take a revolution in technology to make any changes worth while. Think about things like the doorknob, or a book, or a toilet seat, which arguably has been around since Roman times. Now you might say that technology has allowed an evolution of sorts in each of these examples, and that is true (mass production for the doorknob, printing presses, computer fonts and the Macintosh for books, and polymers for toilet seats), but each of these items works fundamentally the same as they have for hundreds of years such that a person from a hundred years ago could still recognize and interface with the device.

Putting a computer on/in a toilet seat is...... *dare I say it?*....... asinine.

Re:Asinine

[jackbird]

Think about things like the doorknob

...which is on its way out in the USA, due to the Americans with Disabilities Act

Re:Asinine

[clockwise_music]

>Most people use toilets more often than iPods.

No shit.

Sorry.

Re:Asinine

[aiken_d]

I tend to agree with you. But then again, I'm sure that plenty of people said exactly the same thing when indoor plumbing replaced outhouses.

-b

Re:Asinine

[TubeSteak]

but each of these items works fundamentally the same as they have for hundreds of years such that a person from a hundred years ago could still recognize and interface with the device.

Have you ever read The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck?
It was written in 1939, but set in the 1920's.

The Joad kids lived on a farm all their life and have never seen a 'real' toilet and when they flush one, they actually thought they broke it. Steinbeck wasn't dramatizing anything, people in the 1920's (and even today) have never seen a flush toilet or any of the other marvels of technology that we take for granted.

That said, I'd pay extra for a heated toilet seat, even without the retractable bidet and ass blow dryer. IMHO, that is more than an incremental improvement.

Re:Asinine

[Pseudonym]

Perhaps more to the point, a toilet is the classic example of something that is mission critical. Sometimes safety critical, I'd suppose. It has to work under all sorts of conditions (e.g. power outage/flat battery) where it's not a huge deal if other devices like the iPod don't work.

The simplicity of a toilet is one of its strengths. Less can go wrong because there's less to go wrong.

Re:Asinine

[WgT2]

Have you ever even seen an outhouse?

Speaking of outhouses: I have two words for you black widows.

Re:Asinine

[Nefarious Wheel]

Speaking of outhouses: I have two words for you black widows

I'll see your black widows and raise you a redback

Snakes and crocodiles aren't really that much of a problem in Australia; the spiders pretty much keep them in line.

Re:Asinine

[Gooba42]

Most toilet clogging happens with toilet paper involved. If there's any trouble to be had with a toilet, this is it and eliminating that last bit of trouble from it sounds like a good thing.

I don't have the cash for it now, but if I did I would definitely look into this sort of device.

How much is it worth to you never to have to use the plunger again?

Re:Asinine

[Gli7ch]

Pfft. Redback. I got bitten by one of when I was four and all that came of it was a few days off kindergarten and a whole backet of jellybeans... After I was rushed to hospital and delivered anti-venom.

Lousy parents didn't take me to the hospital till the next freaking morning. Stupid irresponsible father.

Re:Asinine

[Wordsmith]

And yet toilets clog or overflow with some regularity (particularly if you eat at Denny's a lot). I wouldn't mind a computer-assisted toilet that could identify an address plumbing problems on its own. I also wouldn't mind if it detected a buildup of the ewww-nastiness and cleaned itself once in a while.

Re:Asinine

[Eivind]

Actually, those items may have the best design currently possible for a reasonable price, but none of them are anywhere *CLOSE* to an optimal design. Let's take the good old book as an example. Here's a short list of changes that would be improvements, and that are, as far as I know, perfectly possible, only technology ain't there yet, atleast not for a reasonable price.

• Books are to heavy. An book working exactly like todays books, but at 1/3rd the weigth would be an improvement.
• Books are to thick. Storing books thus takes up to much space. If I could have the same reading-experiment with a book 1/3rd as thick, I'd take it in a second.
• Books can't scale their font. Being able to select a bigger font if you have poor vision would be an improvement.
• Books don't work in the dark. A backligth would be an improvement.
• Books are static, and can't update themselves. A book that could, for example, at your request update itself to the newest revision would be a benefit.
• Books can't read themselves aloud to you. Would be nice when you're driving
• Books can't contain animated pictures. This possibility would be an improvement, particularily for say schoolbooks on physics.
• Books are, very bad at storing sound. *describing* the sound a bird make in a bird-book is infinitely inferior to being able to play the sound.
• Books don't remember at which page you where. (there's add-ons that'll do that though, called bookmarks)
• Your bookshelf can't tell you what that book where that you so enjoyed last christmas.
• Books are hard to backup. There is no practical way of preventing losing your book-collection in say a fire.

I guess what I'm saying is that a *mature* e-book technology (not the crap that goes under e-books today) would have a large number of advantages over todays books. Probably some disadvantages too, allthough I can't think of any fundamental ones at the moment other than the need to be recharged to be usable. (and that's not much of a disadvantage if we assume that battery-life can be made atleast say 20 hours of active use)

You can argue with individual points above. But I don't think you can reasonably argue that *all* of these, and more (it's not hard to make the list of faults in the design of books 3 times as long) are non-improvements.

Books are a good design -- given todays constraints on what is possible at what cost. They are nowhere near an ideal design though.

Re:Asinine

[Anonymous Coward]

A classic quote...

I went to my first computer conference at the New York Hilton about 20 years ago. When somebody there predicted the market for microprocessors would eventually be in the millions, someone else said, Where are they all going to go? It's not like you need a computer in every doorknob!

Years later, I went back to the same hotel. I noticed the room keys had been replaced by electronic cards you slide into slots in the doors.

There was a computer in every doorknob.
Danny Hillis

Re:Asinine

[ericdano]

WTF. You serious? Why? If they can't open a freaking doorknob, what else can't they do? I mean, I'm all for ramps, hanicap parking and stuff, but there is a point where you just gotta say "look, you are going to need someone to do that for you".

Of course, I also believe that California shouldn't have SPANISH on the ballots but whatever.......

Re:Asinine

[Sillygates]

These have been in japan for at least 15 years....by now their toilets are probably bluetooth enabled

Re:Asinine

[ericdano]

So you'd spend thousands of dollars on this crap (pun intended) rather than $15 and some physical exertion?

What, you can't understand how to use a plunger? Perhaps there is a book for dummies on the subject.

Oh, wait, you probably want to put Linux on it so you can time a compile of the latest kernel while taking a crap......

Re:Asinine

[Anonymous Coward]

>optimized to a point where it would take a revolution in technology to make any changes worth while.
Toilets will probably remain exactly the same untill we get mater/energy conversion technology, then we can just relieve ourselves through 'waste extraction' like they do in Star Trek. Computer, beam it out of me.

Re:Asinine

[spectrokid]

When the russians invaded Berlin, they believed toilets were machines for washing potatoes. Working in a HQ were a lot of Russians came was a smelly business to say the least. First time Americans found a microphone in their embassy in Moscow, it was accompanied by 2 beautifull "fingerprints", probably left behind by those who placed the microphone.

Re:Asinine

[Skroggtar]

The thing is, these "flaws" of books are what give them their charm. Sitting next to me is a 70-year-old, worn-down copy of Moby Dick that I alone have read a number of times (not to mention its numerous prior owners). If you were to take away the personality, the wondrous old typeface and beauteous illustrations, the feel of the pages, the heft and mass, I'd rarely read it; it would merely be another file sitting in an ebook reader or what-have-you. Certainly, I run the risk of losing it in a fire, but I accept that risk because I'm just so glad to have it.

Of course, there's the point that books are an artistic medium that one interacts with on a somewhat personal, intimate level, whereas toilets (though occasionally one must get intimate with theirs) is just another static tool for use in the home. Improving a toilet is like updating a computer; the difference being that toilet technology's lifespan is far, far longer than that of any computing device. A toilet/bidet mix would be absolutely adored by most folk, I'm certain, and so would a self-cleaning mechanism.

Re:Asinine

[myth_of_sisyphus]

Oh man. I never even thought of that. If it ever comes up, I'm never, ever going to use an outhouse. I'll go behind it if I have to.

I'll even take the ribbing that comes with it: "that city slicker didn't even know how to use an outhouse!"

Re:Asinine

[njdj]

Have you ever read The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck? It was written in 1939, but set in the 1920's. The Joad kids lived on a farm all their life and have never seen a 'real' toilet and when they flush one,

Have you ever read the post you were replying to? It said, and I quote, "a toilet seat, which arguably has been around since Roman times." The toilet seat has definitely been around since Roman times - I have seen remains of Roman public toilets in the ruins of Ephesus and they surely exist in other places too.

It is well known, and irrelevant, that the flush toilet was not widespread until the 19th century.

Re:Asinine

[berzerke]

How much is it worth to you never to have to use the plunger again?

Not all toilets are designed well. The cheap low-flo's will clog on if you try to flush a pea (pun intended). I lived in an apartment that had them, and I'd plung 3-4 times a week (if I was lucky). I put in good low-flo toilets where I live now (cost about $150 for one, $330 for the other - but that was a special case where the drain wasn't the proper distance). I've plunged once in about 3 years. Nothing high tech about either one.

As a side benefit, I discovered that when the sewer is backing up (my neighbor(s?) like dumping grease down the drain), the toilets flush pattern changes, so I can now get the plumbers out before I have any water in my unit (so far).

Re:Asinine

[x2A]

I see your redback and raise you a redneck... actually, I'm gonna raise a hundred rednecks, yargh har! My own redneck zombie army!!! Will definitely need a computerised toilet for them (<whisper>they don't even know to wipe!</whisper>)

Re:Asinine

[x2A]

The thing is, these "flaws" of toilets are what give them their charm. Sitting next to me is a 70-year-old, worn-down toilet that I alone have used a number of times (not to mention its numerous prior owners). If you were to take away the personality, the weak flushing and beauteous stains, the feel of the seat, the heft and mass, I'd rarely crap in it; it would merely be another toilet sitting in my living room or what-have-you. Certainly, I run the risk of losing it after a curry, but I accept that risk because I'm just so glad to have it.

(sorry :-p)

Re:Asinine

[rtyall]

There's more things coming out as well. The Japanese have been working on toilets which analyse your urine content and warn you of any possible health issues, but this does seem to be taking a while to hit the market. Elsewhere someone came up with the idea of a Urinal that detects whether you've been drinking alcohol and then "recommends" that you don't go driving. This could prove VERY useful to me the-morning-after-the-previous-2-day-binge.

Re:Asinine

[Anonymous Coward]

That said, I'd pay extra for a heated toilet seat, even without the retractable bidet and ass blow dryer. IMHO, that is more than an incremental improvement.

In all my years of sitting on a toilet I don't recall ever thinking "I wish this toilet seat was heated." Is this *really* an issue with people? As for the bidet-functions, just take a shower after defacating and use a Water Pik showerhead to cleanse your ass. I absolutely dread having to use public toilets in an emergency because I know it will be hours before I can get home and take a shower. Just using toilet paper alone results in an itchy butt and I can't even imagine how people can NOT cleanse the area with soap and water after shitting.

Re:Asinine

[Mr. Flibble]

The Joad kids lived on a farm all their life and have never seen a 'real' toilet and when they flush one, they actually thought they broke it. Steinbeck wasn't dramatizing anything, people in the 1920's (and even today) have never seen a flush toilet or any of the other marvels of technology that we take for granted.

After spending 3 weeks in Northern Ontario with Outward Bound when I was 17, I came home and used a toilet for the first time since I had left. For a split second after flushing the thought went through my head: "Oh fuck, I forget how to turn this thing off!"

Re:Asinine

[Danga]

I see your redback and raise you a redneck... actually, I'm gonna raise a hundred rednecks, yargh har! My own redneck zombie army!!!

wouldn't that be the KKK?

Re:Asinine

[drsquare]

Seriously though, there are some things whose design has absolutely been optimized to a point where it would take a revolution in technology to make any changes worth while. Think about things like the doorknob

Actually the doorknob was made obsolete decades ago by the door handle.

Re:Asinine

[drsquare]

That said, I'd pay extra for a heated toilet seat, even without the retractable bidet and ass blow dryer. IMHO, that is more than an incremental improvement.

Wouldn't it be easier to get heating in your house?

Re:Asinine

[drsquare]

Books are to heavy. An book working exactly like todays books, but at 1/3rd the weigth would be an improvement.

Books are incredibly light actually. Maybe you should hit the weights now and again? If they were lighter and smaller they'd just get damaged more easily. Thinner pages would rip and be transparent.

Books can't scale their font. Being able to select a bigger font if you have poor vision would be an improvement.
Books don't work in the dark. A backligth would be an improvement.

Then it's a good thing we have glasses and electricity. Even medieval people had candles. Reading backlit screens in the dark fucks your eyes up anyway.

Books can't read themselves aloud to you. Would be nice when you're driving

You can get books on tape. Welcome to the 1970s.

Books are, very bad at storing sound. *describing* the sound a bird make in a bird-book is infinitely inferior to being able to play the sound.

No, it isn't. Maybe if you're illiterate.

Your bookshelf can't tell you what that book where that you so enjoyed last christmas.

If you enjoyed it that much you'd have remembered what it is.

Books are hard to backup. There is no practical way of preventing losing your book-collection in say a fire.

How do you backup your expensive ebook reader when it's burnt to a crisp.

Re:Asinine

[Filmcell-Keyrings]

Don't have a link as I saw it in a magazine, but you can get a toilet roll holder with built in speakers and iPod dock, so now you can do both at the same time

Re:Asinine

[Meneguzzi]

OK, perhaps slashdot is not the right place to put this kind of joke, but I cannot help myself. This "electronic toilet" reminded me of an old joke with similar circumstances, it goes more or less like this (pardon for the brit slang, but I think it adds a nice touch to the joke):
A man (let's call him Colin) goes in a posh restaurant, and in the middle of the meal he needs a loo stop, so he goes to the toilet where a toilet attendant starts explaining these new brilliantly modern toilets, that he should start pressing the buttons from left to right when he is done to get the complete cleansing. The only problem is that these wonder toilets is that they only manufacture the unissex version of it, so he warns Colin that under no circumstance should he press the red button, because that button was designed for female use.
So Colin goes about to do his business and when he is done he starts pressing the buttons as instructed, which causes wonderfully warm water to wash him, after which a dryer at a very comfortable temperature dries him followed by some moisturiser. After this brilliant experience, Colin is awfully curious about the red button. He ponders for a couple of minutes and thinks, bollocks, I'm gonna use it. He presses the button, and a hideous scream is heard throughout the restaurant.
A couple of days later he wakes up in hospital, bandages on his crotch. The doctors explain to him that the red button was the tampon extractor function, and he should have never had pressed it.

Re:Asinine

[moonbender]

Are you insane? How are you gonna heat a whole house with nothing but heated toilet seats?!

Re:Asinine

[Grab]

Actually American flap-operated toilets are over-simplified. It's very easy for the flaps to fail open or to leak, and a shitload of water (or more accurately, many shitload-disposals'-worth of water) gets wasted because of this.

UK toilets use a siphon-operated system instead. Push the lever down, it sucks water round the top of the siphon, and the cistern empties using that siphon effect. The great thing with that is that it simply *can't* leak (unless you manage to get a hole in the pipe, which is majorly unlikely).

Grab.

Re:Asinine

[James McGuigan]

A better solution is redundancy, have a second one around so that if the first one is taken out of action, you have the time to fix it without having to worry where your next shit is going to go.

Re:Asinine

[Fred_A]

I heard the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation was indeed working on replacement technology, including some sort of "feel good" technology that's apparently very hush hush...

Re:Asinine

[Fred_A]

It is well known, and irrelevant, that the flush toilet was not widespread until the 19th century.

I have seen "self flushing" toilets that were nicely designed by getting a little water to run through a little U shaped trench under them. Inside the house. In a 11th century (roughly, if I remember correctly) Icelandic house of Viking (long house) design. There were no traces found of seats though, so it wasn't clear whether there actually were any.

In Medieval castles one had to "flush" by hand but the evacuation was built in by having the toilets either placed above a hole that was on the outer wall or by going to an inner chamber (typically still often renamed "oubliette" nowadays, even though there actually was no such thing). A septic tank really.

Re:Asinine

[Fred_A]

Yeah, well I'm not debugging that !

Re:Asinine

[Anonymous Coward]

*New* digital technology?? I don't get it. I've been doing number 1's and 10's for years.

Re:Asinine

[Anonymous Coward]

Ever heard of door handles? We use them in the rest of the world.

Re:Asinine

[Anonymous Coward]

A better solution is redundancy, have a second one around..

Three is even better. Even when there's only two of you. One awaiting repair, one for me and one for my wife. A couple of weeks ago we even had two toilets out of action at one time** and we were still 'good to go'.

** Plumbing note: All three toilets were badly fitted and have leaked in a variety of surprising ways. The former owner of my house was a builder and plumber.
Naturally, since I've fixed them they've all been fine. I'm not a plumber and have no training in these matters - I just used common sense such as using flexible waterproof jointing compound (instead of hard drying stuff that cracks), screwing the toilets to thew floor properly (instead of using whatever screws were lying around even though they only gripped 1mm into the floor), and not cross threading the inlet pipes.
This is why I never employ 'professionals' or 'experts' to do these things unless I have absolutely no choice. And don't get we started on the standard of his (former house owner's) electrical wiring (bizarre, abysmal and lethal come to mind). And the guy's dead now so I can't even sue him for endangering my life...

Re:Asinine

[Anonymous Coward]

you sir, must take one mean dump. are you sure your diet is ok?

Re:Asinine

[LordSnooty]

Being in the UK I see your redneck and raise you a stiff neck from the bone-chilling breeze in that outside toilet...

Re:Asinine

[Anonymous Coward]

the sewer is backing up? where do you live? azerbadjan?

Re:Asinine

[Anonymous Coward]

Man I hate the undead - especially the homeless ones...

Re:Asinine

[WgT2]

I should have said brown recluse as these photos tell why.

Re:Asinine

[MECC]

it would merely be another toilet sitting in my living room

Umm... Living room ..?

Re:Asinine

[rbarreira]

Regarding the last past of your post, I have to refer you to a proverb we have in Portugal:

"Em casa de ferreiro, espeto de pau."

It roughly means "In the blacksmith's house, you'll find a wooden skewer". Strangely, it seems to be true in many cases.

Re:Asinine

[Anonymous Coward]

That said, I'd pay extra for a heated toilet seat, even without the retractable bidet and ass blow dryer. IMHO, that is more than an incremental improvement.

err.. sounds more like an "excremental" improvement.
sorry, had to say it :)

Re:Asinine

[electronerdz]

All of this is moot when you are sitting through a hurricane and all you have a is a candle, and your computer with its ebook reader has no electricity to run. Or the battery runs out on a PDA because the power is out for a week. It's also cheaper to buy a book when you consider the cost of the computer and software. And that it is not very portable. And a PDA is useless... ever tried reading a book on a PDA? I did once when I first got a PDA... 2 minutes later, I put it down and did something else more meaningful. A real book can go with you in the middle of a huge field where you sit under a tree for hours reading it.

Re:Asinine

[mblase]

Jeeeez, talk about flushing money down the drain....... :-)

Well, there are some people who just have to have the latest high-tech commode-ities.

Re:Asinine

[Silverstrike]

Its really not that ridiculous. It might seem like it at first, but think about it.

But what is it really? It's a luxury item. Granted perhaps one with limited appeal, but it is certainly no less ridiculous than a lot of other luxury items popular today. Need some examples?

A $3000, 50" flat screen TV. A $200 CRT will let you watch TV too. Hell, a TV in general is a luxury item.

Any car costing over $15,000. If you live in a city, any car at all

Cell Phones. Period.

That list is endless, really. It's all about who it appeals too. TBH, the idea that my toilet will one day wash my ass, blow dry it, and then analyze my piss and tell me that I had better see a proctologist because I have some cancer brewing, all sounds pretty good to me.

Re:Asinine

[bcattwoo]

For Pete's sake, does every discussion eventually have to devolve into America bashing? ;)

Re:Asinine

[kniLnamiJ-neB]

Slashdot... news for turds, stuff that splatters.

Re:Asinine

[AllergicToMilk]

Abrasively scrubbing your ass clean with paper. I really doesn't seem hard to improve on that concept given the slightest moment of thought. Folks have been using bidets for ages. Even the Romans were smart enough to use damp sponges to clean themselves. The Japanese figured out how to incorporate the bidet function into toilet seats, reducing space requirements and associated expense. I tried these on a trip to Japan several years ago and got one for myself when I got back. I'd never have a house without one. Much more healthy and sanitary.

Re:Asinine

[GooberToo]

The toilet set has been around since at least 1000bc in Egypt. The generally looked like a lattice-box. People of importance and wealth often had one made of stone. People of moderate wealth often had one made of of wood. Everyone else simply squated. All wiped with their fingers.

Re:Asinine

[defvayne23]

No they ditched that name a long time ago, now the KKK is the NRA (National Rifle Association).

Re:Asinine

[Anonymous Coward]

Jeeeez, talk about flushing money down the drain....... :-)

That's what my grandpa said when my uncle decided to build an inside bathroom in Grandpa's house.

the humble American commode has remained as low tech as things get, essentially a combination of pipes, levers and flaps

His was four walls, a roof, a bench with a hole in it and a toilet seat screwed on, placed over a pit in the ground. It was called an "outhouse" and the only way to get more low-twch would be to shit in the woods and wipe with leaves.

At least Grandpa had graduated from the Sears catalog to real toilet paper.

Re:Asinine

[ubergenius]

Oh God! Don't ever show those photos again!

Re:Asinine

[Dorothy 86]

Didn't they do that in "The Island?"

Re:Asinine

[Anonymous Coward]

The sit down toilet we use today is actually over-engineered as it is.
The squat toilet: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Squat_toilet is more sanitary, better for posture and relieves such things as piles (hemorrhoids).

A/C

lovely - I see that my word to prove I'm not a script is "overflow" - not an issue with squat toilets.

Re:Asinine

[hey!]

Jeeeez, talk about flushing money down the drain

Well, consider this: is it cheaper to operate a massive tractor trailer truck, or a compact car?

The answer is, it depends on the volume of load you're attempting to carry.

Now here's an interesting scenario: you own a downtown theater. At intermission, the patrons crowd the bathrooms. At over $100 a seat, they don't want to spend all the intermission waiting in line for a toilet, then miss the start of the third act. Plus time the spend in line is time they don't spend buying drinks from the bar. So that means you have to put plenty of toilets in; given the cost of downtown real estate this is expensive; in practical terms it means that you take space away from the bar and seating for sanitary functions. Now, studies show that the average person takes (I'll pull numbers from my proverbial ass here) five seconds to disrobe, twenty seconds to eliminate, forty seconds to clean himself, and five seconds to rerobe, for a total toilet time of 70 seconds. Automating the cleaning process drops the cleaning time to twenty seconds; your toilet now has increased its capacity in patrons per unit time from 0.014/sec to .02 per second, a respectable 40% gain in throughput.

Furthermore, let's say there are people who, for some reason, don't get off the pot when they're done. Who knows why? Maybe there fiddling with their palm pilots. However, you find that the completion of the automated washing function seems to send the message that their time in the stall is up, and now you find that each enhanced toilet is handling patrons at twice the rate of their conventional counterparts. The result is patrons, on average, spend much less time waiting for the toilet,and having more time on their hands with nothing urgent to do, go to the bar to buy drinks at twice the cost you'd be able to charge a respectable pub.

For you, the intelligent toilets aren't just toilets: they're gold mines. So what the hell; throw in the seat warmer so they think you're being elegant; you're really getting them off the can faster.

Re:Asinine

[hswerdfe]

a revolution in technology

like the 3 seashell thing?

Re:Asinine

[elrous0]

Outhouses were actually a step BACKWARDS. Adding in plumbing just brought us back to a much better ancient technology. Hell, even the Romans had plumbing (the elites anyway). Outhouses were an unsanitary health hazard, necessitated by poverty and poor infrastructure (particularly in remote locations). After all, most people don't particularly LIKE the idea of having more fecal matter in their groundwater, if they can avoid it.

-Eric

Re:Asinine

[Zerbey]

You are right, there has been improvements in indoor plumbing over the years but there has only been two major innovations (in my mind) that have benefitted the humble WC:

1. Automatic air freshners (let's be honest, faeces smell)
2. Automatic flushers (for the assholes [and their owners] in public bathrooms who do not flush).

What I would like to see is something other than toilet paper for cleaning oneself that's hygenic, clean and doesn't involve me shoving my hand up my arse. No, not a bidet, something simpler. Whoever invents that is going to be a billionaire (three seashells anyone? ;-)).

Re:Asinine

[Anonymous Coward]

I've got nothing against that Act, but did they have to call it the "Americans with Disabilities Act"? Since the Act is part of US law, I would think it was fairly obvious who it would apply to. Unless, of course, there is also an "Evil Foreigners with Disabilities (Hehehe)" Act too.

Re:Asinine

[elrous0]

Agreed. It only takes one America-basher for the civility of the conversation to go right down the shitter.

-Eric

Re:Asinine

[elrous0]

I can't even imagine how people can NOT cleanse the area with soap and water after shitting.

Well, it's not like we're grabbing stuff and eating with it.

-Eric

Re:Asinine

[morgan_greywolf]

WTF. You serious? Why? If they can't open a freaking doorknob, what else can't they do? I mean, I'm all for ramps, hanicap parking and stuff, but there is a point where you just gotta say "look, you are going to need someone to do that for you".

Yep. If you haven't noticed, doorknobs are more and more being replaced by doors that push open, open automatically, or, nominally, by door handles that do not require grasping in order to turn them.

The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) makes it very clear that you have to make accommodations for anyone with any sort of disability to get around. This includes replacing or augmenting doorknobs with other ways of opening doors because some people with severe arthritis, Parkinson's, mental handicaps, spinal cord injuries and some other disorders simply cannot turn a doorknob.

Re:Asinine

[jargon82]

Saves time during "the big game"

Re:Asinine

[jdcook]

As an Amurrican living in the UK, this explains something that puzzled me: All UK toilets don't seem able to flush. All you get is an anemic flow which is woefully insufficient. And not just because of my gigantic red-white-and-blue steamers either. EVERYWHERE you go in the UK you find a toilet brush next to the toilet. Including public facilities. Why? Because their toilets can't flush (for) shit. I have this vision of the queen having a jewel-encrusted gold-plated toilet brush and having to get it out whenever she pinches off some spotted dick. I mean, it isn't the sort of thing one would want one's servants to deal with, right? Pictures would probably end up in the Sun or something.

Re:Asinine

[sherms]

Helping the disabled is great but you have to admit it gives a whole new perspective of "shit or get off the pot!"

Re:Asinine

[Rei]

This whole article isn't "news" to the Japanese. Here's a picture of a toilet that I took inside the cheapest youth hostel in Tokyo that had rooms available when I was there:

http://www.daughtersoftiresias.org/Japan%20Trip/.. . hmm, looks like the URL is down. Well, lets grab one that looks the same from images.google.com.
http://www.crappersquarterly.com/images/japan/Japa neseToilet.jpg

You see "warmlets" even in the most middle-of-nowhere places. Part of the reason why toilet tech is so advanced over there is that western-style toilets are competing against tradition -- the ever-annoying squat toilet -- and so need all the bells and whistles they can get.

Re:Asinine

[Ravatar]

Hand crank-generated power, DUH!

Re:Asinine

[ColdWetDog]

Well, no one's talked about Nazi's yet...

Re:Asinine

[BiggerBoat]

I have a couple of American friends who have similar complaints about their UK toilet experiences. They report that it's nearly impossible to finish up after taking a dump without leaving "loaf marks" on the bowl as a present for the next user. They did not report anything about toilet brushes, perhaps because they didn't want to play plumber each time.

Re:Asinine

[profplump]

Books are incredibly light actually.

I think your local library would beg to differ. Reducing the weight of books would simplify shelving and general architectural design of libraries.

If they were lighter and smaller they'd just get damaged more easily. Thinner pages would rip and be transparent.

That's not quite "working exactly like today's books" then is it? Non-paper technologies (even non-electronic ones) might well be thinner, stronger, and more opaque than traditional paper books.

Then it's a good thing we have glasses and electricity.

Yes, because it's really handy to hold a magnifying glass in your arthritic hands while reading the newspaper. Thanks for your compassion.

Even medieval people had candles. Reading backlit screens in the dark fucks your eyes up anyway.

That's just blatantly false. A properly illuminated screen will not "fuck your eyes up". Having a single, high-intensity illumination setting is not the only option for an ebook.

No, it isn't. Maybe if you're illiterate.

In case you've never visited the non-fiction section, there are books with non-literary descriptions of sounds. Maybe you don't want someone to imitate the sounds described in a story, but in a bird-watching guide it *would* be useful to have actual sound samples, rather than pseudo-phonetic descriptions of sounds that have no linguistic basis.

How do you backup your expensive ebook reader when it's burnt to a crisp.

How do you back up your expensive non-e-book when it's burnt to a crisp? At least with the e-book you can make a copy before the fire -- photocopying 400 pages however, doesn't seem very practical.

Re:Asinine

[blueturffan]

Slashdot... news for turds, stuff that splatters.

Umm... wouldn't that be:

Splashdot...news for turds, stuff that splatters?

Re:Asinine

[crabpeople]

"a shitload of water (or more accurately, many shitload-disposals'-worth of water) gets wasted because of this."

Well you dont pay for water, and its a renewable resource, so who cares?

Re:Asinine

[ericdano]

Insane. If they cannot "simply turn a doorknob" what else can they not do? What else to we need to do to give this very small percent of the population help? How much money are we wasting doing this? Couldn't we put this money to better use like, oh, fighting poverty?

How often do people with mental handicaps who cannot open a door with a knob on it go out by themselves?

Re:Asinine

[pjp6259]

About 10 years ago I was in Europe, and used a toilet where the flush behavior was triggered by a pedal on the floor. Probably much more sanitary than everyone touching the same lever with the hands they just used to wipe with. There is an example of a fairly simple modification that hasn't caught on over here yet, and their are probably hundreds of other modifications that could improve the toilet a bit.

In addition, I would love it if my toilet could do a spectrum analysis of my uh, deposit, and let me know if my diet is unhealthy, I've got internal bleeding, imminent liver failure, etc.

Re:Asinine

[dgatwood]

The ADA is blamed for a lot of expenses, but most of those expenses come because of idiotic people who just look for reasons to sue. The way the law is written, you have to make areas that are accessible to the general public be in full compliance because they could potentially be utilized by someone with a disability at any time and without notice. For nonpublic areas, you merely must make "reasonable accommodations" on a by-request basis.

On the issue of doorknobs, I happen to prefer handles instead of knobs. They're easier to open when your hands are tied up (carrying something, covered in mud/grease, etc.). If the cost is similar, it makes sense to use handles just for convenience reasons. Now if you are asking if you should have to retrofit a building, it becomes a question of whether this is an area that serves the general public (in which case the answer is yes) or a private area (in which case the answer is "only if someone asks, and only in the areas that this person must typically enter").

That said, IANADL (I am not a disability lawyer), so this should not be taken as legal advice.

Re:Asinine

[StikyPad]

Also because Japan is the most gadget-obsessed culture in the world.

And for those wondering about the squatter toilets in Japan: No, the typical Japanese public toilet user isn't any better at getting it in the bowl than your typical public toilet user anywhere else in the world, and it's not unusual for the floor around the squatter to be covered in either urine, feces, vomit, or some combination thereof.

Re:Asinine

[Anonymous Coward]

huh, I'm curious as to how your friends were able to consume enough food to ever need to take substantial dumps in the UK, the cuisine is downright awful.

Re:Asinine

[The Snowman]

Disabilities? Try turning a doorknob when your hands are full, for example, when carrying a box. Trust me, I moved three times so far this year. It's a pain in the ass. Door handles make this much easier. Just push down to turn, then walk forward. Works great. Also, handles are better than knobs if you're drunk.

Re:Asinine

[Geosota]

If you buy into electronic toiletry, make sure you also get a back-up generator. During a recent power-outage here in Florida, I was quite grateful that, unlike any other appliance in the house except my bed, the toilet was entirely mechanical.

Re:Asinine

[Grab]

Well you dont pay for water, and its a renewable resource, so who cares?

Where are you from, then? My house is on a water meter, so we *do* pay. Most of the UK is too.

As for the renewable resource - sure, but it's gone through a lot of processing between collection and delivery to us, and all the energy put into that is wasted.

Re:Asinine

[rifter]

Insane. If they cannot "simply turn a doorknob" what else can they not do? What else to we need to do to give this very small percent of the population help? How much money are we wasting doing this? Couldn't we put this money to better use like, oh, fighting poverty?

If they are opening these doors it means they are going to work and/or shopping. We *are* fighting poverty by making it easier for people to contribute to society in those and other ways.

How often do people with mental handicaps who cannot open a door with a knob on it go out by themselves?

It depends on how much time they spend posting on slashdot. :P

Re:Asinine

[Eivind]

You are rigth: It is *possible* if you try very hard, to construct a scenario where my hypothethical e-book would be inferior to todays books.

That doesn't mean, though, that the e-book is in *general* inferior.

How large a portion of the reading in oh, say, the USA takes place under conditions where, as you suggest:

• There is no electrical power.
• There *was* no electrical power for the last week (thus the batteries are flat)

0.001% of the reading ? 0.0001% of the reading ?

I *perfectly* agree that books are about the best we can do at todays tech-level. If that wasn't so, books would already be dying out (which they aren't).

All I'm saying is that it's easy to imagine improvements to books. They are nowhere close to perfect.

Pricing is interesting. It's true a mature, good ebook (NOT the crap we have today, I explicitly said those are crap) would likely cost more than a single paper-book. The thing is though, a ebook-reader can be used to read any number of books. And the distribution and publishing-costs are a lot lower.

It's not clear that ebooks are more expensive when you take this into account. Infact it would be reasonable to expect the oposite to be true.

Please note, however, that the price you pay for books are only tangentially connected to the production and distribution-costs of those books. Mostly it's a matter of what people are *willing* to pay for the books, and how much more you'd sell if you lowered the price how much. (which explains why a song of iTunes is *more* expensive than simply buying the CD in many cases)

Re:Asinine

[Eivind]

Books are incredibly light actually. Maybe you should hit the weights now and again? If they were lighter and smaller they'd just get damaged more easily. Thinner pages would rip and be transparent.

I'm not saying books are heavy (though they are!), I'm saying, all else being equal, lower weigth would be an advantage. It is true that current paper-tech has problems making them ligther without making them transparent and/or more rip-prone. That's another area of possible improvement.

Books can't scale their font. Being able to select a bigger font if you have poor vision would be an improvement.

Then it's a good thing we have glasses and electricity.

That doesn't contradict my statement. The fact that you can solve a problem in *one* way is no proof that a second solution would not be preferable.

Reading backlit screens in the dark fucks your eyes up anyway.

Only if the screen-tech is poor (which it is today). Your eyes can't magically know if a certain photon was *generated* by a page of text or if it was simply *reflected* of a page of text. The reason screens offer inferior readability to paper today are things like low resolution, disturbing reflexes in the glass, limited contrast etc. All of these problems are solvable, and likely *will* be solved in the next few decades. I'm surprised if e-books don't outsell paperbased books 5:1 before I retire. (35 years)

You can get books on tape. Welcome to the 1970s.

Yeah. If you pay $20 for the audio-tape (or CD) on top of the $10 you already paid for the book, and bring some sort of player-device with you. And if you limit yourself to reading that 1% of material where there is audio-versions available. That is not the same as having the ebook-reader capable of reading any normal english text.

*describing* the sound a bird make in a bird-book is infinitely inferior to being able to play the sound.

No, it isn't. Maybe if you're illiterate.

It may not be "infinitely" superior. But it clearly is, infact, superior. A recording of a sound *plus* a textual description of a sound gives significantly more information than *only* the textual description.

How do you backup your expensive ebook reader when it's burnt to a crisp.

You're assuming the reader is the expensive part. This is very unlikely to be the case. Even today, an iPod full of legal music has music worth atleast an order of magnitude more than the player.

Furthermore, the player can (assuming you used content stored in open formats) easily be replaced if it breaks. That's not the case with the content.

A simple example will demonstrate the difference;

If my house burns, there's a high chance the letters I got from my first girlfriend way-back-when will all be irrevocably lost. It'd be a hassle out of proportion to the importance to make a "backup" of them, or to store them in such a manner that fire couldn't get to them. Making backups, or otherwise securing them would be *possible*, but very costly in time and/or money.

The emails I got in the first years I knew my now-wife, on the other hand are securely backed up, along with everything else digital that I care about, separately stored in 3 different buildings, in 2 different countries. Destroying them all would take insane unluck, or nuclear war. The total work associated with making, distributing and updating the backups is perhaps a single days work.

It takes *deliberate* stupidity to claim that this is not an advantage.

Re:Asinine

[Eivind]

Sure. But you can have both.

I've got photoalbums. They contain photos, on photopaper. And text written by me and/or my wife. Many of them have great affectionate value to us. The album is not much different than the albums my grandmother used to have, except the pictures are sharper and in color.

Our son will be small only once. If we should lose the pictures of him as a toddler, the pictures would *stay* gone.

So, because the photos are taken with a digital camera, there's backups of them. Geographically distributed backups. This sounds complicated -- it's not. It's as simple as giving grandmother a DVD with all pictures of her grandson, along with the album containing profesionally printed copies of the best of them. Additional expense ? literally 10 minutes of work and $0.50

The knowledge that *should* disaster strike and say burn our home to the ground, we can still, if not reconstruct the original album, then atleast still look at all the original pictures is worth a lot. Certainly more than $0.50

My grandmother didn't have that option. The few pictures she have, some are physically degraded to the point where they're hardly watchable. Some are simply lost. And the remaining ones needs to be shared between her kids, there's only a single copy of most pictures, and making aditional copies is time and cost-prohibitive for all but a few photos. (those you care the most about)

I'm certain you're rigth that some books will stay on paper for a long time, for affectionate reasons.

But lets face it, that's not the case for 99% or more of all bougth books. I don't particularily care about physical hundreds of old paperbacks I have, I *would* be highly annoyed if I lost them all though, because it'd mean I either couldn't read them anymore, or would have to re-purchase them.

Re:Asinine

[Gooba42]

Where, precisely, did I imply I don't understand the plunger? I just expressed a distaste for the thing.

Do you not understand how to dig your own sewer lines? Then why would you pay someone to do it for you!

Moo

[Chacham]

And the warm water, once we got the temperature right, was also a luxurious twist on the normal bathroom experience.

The bathroom experience?

I'd rather see Larson's idea of a big light over public bathroom doors: "Didn't wash hands!"

Re:Moo

[megaditto]

Don't underestimate the importance of the restroom experience. How about this:
-a moistened TP dispencer (for when the 'roids start acting up) w/ antiseptic
-armrests and an executive leather ergonomic backrest
-a webcam with a UV spotlight to examine for traces of fecal matter (battle the 'klingons')
-a penile/scrotal 'cupholder' (hate when 'it' touches the cold porcelain)
-a control to adjust seat angle and elevation
-negative-pressure air exhaust for the toiletbowl (why do I have to smell it?)
-surround sound and dimmer lights (pooping in the dark could be a wild adventure (This Disney's Pirate Cave boatride!))
-neon pool lighting (aesthetically pleasing fishbowl; combine with dimmer lights et webcam)
-a timer/bestOf scoreboard!
-a shotgun rack and a Peltier beer cooler (hate the compressor fridge noise).
-stall doors that freaking go all the way to the floor!

Re:Moo

[Animaether]

- you can already get moistened TP dispensers. There's one problem with these - they're expensive. I'd rather see that more places (restaurants, etc.) start using the toilet seat cover dispensers as found in any airport (well, not Schiphol - where they want you to wet some toilet paper and scrub.. arguably better) and airplane

- armrests? aren't you supposed to hold part of your body, at least if you're male, to make sure you're not just going to flop all over the place with that thing? And what when you want to wipe your ass? Just for kicks, try making that motion while seater in your chair with armrests. And a leather backrest? Would that be built into the toilet lid? If so - how do you handle flushing with the lid closed? ( presuming you flush with the lid closed - unless you love the spray of course )

- klingons / dingleberries? if you miss one of those, you probably didn't wipe well enough - do you really need a webcam to see where you need to wipe some more? Scary. You're never going to get it 100% clean.. if you could, you wouldn't have a particular need change underwear every day. Fact is, you're going to leak more pee than you'll have to worry about with poo.

- penile/scrotal cupholder just sounds like an STD-spreading device. The solution to not having your penis or scrotum hit the porcelain is to get a decent bowl - sounds like the one you've dealt with/are dealing with is far too shallow. Either that or you're just very, very well-endowed; congratulations ;)

- seat angle and elevation.. now this one I can get into, but mostly due to the fact that the elderly can't sit all the way down on typical toilet seats easily - so you can get taller ones for them. While at the same time, what parent hasn't had to hoist their kid up onto the toilet? Now if you could make it alter elevation, that would indeed be cool. It'd also be a bit more difficult to manage with regards to flushing-as-we-know-it, though

- you don't have to smell the toilet, typically.. unless you live in Europe and still have an older style bowl where your faecal matter just rests in a small puddle before getting flushed ('observation deck' bowls), you'll have one where all that stuff goes into a deep body of water where no odor can escape. Presumably you'd also have some manner of perfumed flush block thingy in there to keep whatever diluted smell of urine covered.

the remainder of the list is just getting silly.. why no HD TV? fold-out laptop with broadband internet? make the seat double as a massage chair and shoepolish station! Let's leave it at it being a restroom, please :)

That said, there have been advances even in recent decades as far as the toilet seat goes. e.g. from the 'observation deck' style to the deep bowl style, and from a regular gravity-does-it-all flush to a gravity+jet-flush, from one-flush-fits-all to the water conserving dual-flush-capacity tanks, etc. Maybe they're nowhere near as cool as an elevation-controllable toilet, but they're worthy progressions nevertheless.

Re:Moo

[DJPenguin]

Congratulations - you are now officially slashdot's leading toilet expert :)

Re:Moo

[x2A]

...and next week on Pimp My Toilet...

Re:Moo

[Barnoid]

Don't underestimate the importance of the restroom experience. How about this:
...
-a penile/scrotal 'cupholder' (hate when 'it' touches the cold porcelain)
...
-negative-pressure air exhaust for the toiletbowl (why do I have to smell it?)
...

Conclusion: 'it' smells

Re:Moo

[Anonymous Coward]

make the seat double as a massage chair.

can it perform a happy ending? sign me up

Re:Moo

[hankwang]

you'll have one where all that stuff goes into a deep body of water where no odor can escape

Splash!
The American toilets don't splash because the water level is much higher than the modern European style, but OTOH they consume much more water for each flush (at least I think so).

Re:Moo

[jez9999]

Scrotal cupholder? You sound like you're actually dropping your penis inside the urinal... why on Earth are you doing this? I've never seen anyone accidentally touch a urinal, you aim from a distance. Sounds like you need to learn how to use one.

Re:Moo

[thePowerOfGrayskull]

- you don't have to smell the toilet, typically.. unless you live in Europe and still have an older style bowl where your faecal matter just rests in a small puddle before getting flushed ('observation deck' bowls), you'll have one where all that stuff goes into a deep body of water where no odor can escape.

Clearly, you've never eaten beans.

Re:Moo

[herrison]

slashpot?

Re:Moo

[nogginthenog]

I've only ever seen 'observation decks' in continental Europe. The UK seems to have skipped these. IIRC they do serve a purpose in countries that eat lots of undercooked pork - to check for worms.

Re:Moo

[dr_dank]

I'm just stunned that I read the words "scrotal cupholder" on Slashdot. Now I've read everything.

Re:Moo

[gihan_ripper]

-stall doors that freaking go all the way to the floor!

Interesting that you mention this point. In the UK (and most countries I've been to), it is generally impossible to see into a toilet stall from outside. I've only encountered the 'open' stall in the US. I really don't understand why it's necessary to have a small gap at the floor. More disconcerting are the gaps at the door hinges. Anyone can walk up to the stall and peer in. I wonder if this is aimed at making the toilet experience somewhat less leisurely and thereby increasing productivity?

Re:Moo

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd rather see Larson's idea of a big light over public bathroom doors: "Didn't wash hands!"

That reminds me of a joke an Irish fellow told me.

An Irishman is using the urinal while an Englishman is washing his hands. They both walk out of the rest room. "Sir," says the English gentleman, "In England we wash our hands after using the restroom!"

"Yeah?" says the Irishman, "Well, in Ireland we don't piss on our fingers!"

Re:Moo

[Sponge Bath]

penile/scrotal cupholder just sounds like an STD-spreading device

Sounds like Paris Hilton.

Re:Moo

[thewiz]

I'm sure he's flush with excitement about your announcement!

Re:Moo

[Hatta]

So would RMS have a problem using a toilet he didn't have the source code for?

Re:Moo

[einnar2000]

Congratulations - you are now officially slashdot's leading toilet expert :)

I was thinking fecalfeliac. (coprophiliac, actually.)

Go ahead

[wickedsteve]

Get your self a fancy shmancy hi tech toilet. I will stick with my old school mechanical toilet. And when the nukes and EMPs hit us, I will be the only one with a decent place to take a crap.

Re:Go ahead

[Patrik_AKA_RedX]

You're asuming your toilet wouldn't be right in the center of the explosion. I mean if I would attack your country, the first thing I'd do is a full out asssault on every toilet. Then food drops followed by food-with-laxative drops. All that is left then is to wait until every soldier blows up because of the need and inability to go. Then the survivers get to clean the whole mess up in exchange for toilet priveledges. Trust me, they'll be very eager at this point.
All that then is left is a nation wide Wash-Your-Hands-Campagne.

Re:Go ahead

[Anonymous Coward]

When the nukes hit us you'll be shitting everywhere

Re:Go ahead

[Sax Maniac]

Congratulations, you just invented the plot of a Broadway musical ("Urinetown").

Re:Go ahead

[Anonymous Coward]

And when the nukes and EMPs hit us, I will be the only one with a decent place to take a crap.

I think I'll just crap my pants if that happens.

Re:Go ahead

[SonicSpike]

Nuclear attack on a toilet?

Yeah - I've eaten at Taco Bell before.

WTF?

[BrokenHalo]

Most people use toilets more often than iPods

I can't remember the last time my iPod used the toilet...

Re:WTF?

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

"I can't remember the last time my iPod used the toilet..."

A friend of mine peed on his iPod.. but I don't think that's enough to contradict the statement.

Re:WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

You have to train them in at a young age. Otherwise they just "do their business" in your pocket, while you're trying to look cool with your white earbuds at the bus stop, hoping the cute girl will ask you what you're listening to...

Re:WTF?

[jkrise]

Q: What do toilets and iPods have in common?
A: Both are used for downloading crap!

Re:WTF?

[WilliamSChips]

I don't think I've ever downloaded anything with my iPod. To my iPod yes, but not with it.

Re:WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

You apparently don't have the iGuy, do you?

Power outages

[UbuntuDupe]

Back in May where I live, there was a severe storm that knocked out power for, depending on where you live, 12-72 hours. Being without power in the black of night with rain pounding on my windows and having to navigate with a flashlight made me realize how thankful I am that the toilet DOES NOT depend on electricity.

Please folks, make sure the technology makes you better off than before.

Re:Power outages

[TigerPaw]

Being without power in the black of night with rain pounding on my windows and having to navigate with a flashlight made me realize how thankful I am that the toilet DOES NOT depend on electricity.

And when lights came on, you realized that it wasn't the toiletseat you were sitting on...

Re:Power outages

[kihjin]

You can't just deny technological progress by claiming the status quo is sufficient! Horses and buggies were "sufficient" at one point too!

The obvious solution for a power outage is to purchase a dedicated backup power generator. If you lose power, the Toilet will switch to "battery."

See? Problem solved.

Re:Power outages

[Rekolitus]

Wouldn't that result in a few toilets with bad batteries exploding?

Re:Power outages

[UbuntuDupe]

If you're making a subtle joke about the quixoticity of installing a whole dedicated backup battery generator, just so your toilet can use electricity, good one.

If you're serious, well, that's going to far. All I want is for there to be some decoupling from the electrical aspect. For example, in the storm, I could still open my garage because it has a backup cord with which I can manually lift it open. Likewise, for the toilet, the plumbing could be run as now, with just the unnecessary electrical parts separate. But I just get the funny feeling that some moron is going to design it so that you literally *can't flush* merely because you lost power.

Re:Power outages

[kihjin]

Yeah, I was kidding :P

Re:Power outages

[Nefarious Wheel]

a subtle joke about the quixoticity of

Please, someone come up with another use for quixoticity? I REALLY want this one in general use.

Of course, I could be tilting at windmills here...

Re:Power outages

[catbutt]

I think you're kidding but....

I'm quite sure you can use the toilet if the power is off. It just won't be warm and wash your butt for you. I'm pretty sure as well that most people who own one will still keep toilet paper or tissues in the bathroom.

Given that these things are everywhere in Japan (and bidets have been around in europe for half a century at least), I don't see what the big deal is. Some people like to be squeaky clean, and have some cash to spare. I can think of lots of more frivolous ways to spend a few hundred bucks.

Re:Power outages

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmm... that is only true if you happen to live in an area with a pressurized water supply line. There are plenty of people in the US yet that happen to be on wells with electricity driven pumps. Luckily, gravity is still the major operator in this case, it's just that getting caught without a proper "flushing" supply of water really sucks.

Re:Power outages

[utnapistim]

The obvious solution for a power outage is to purchase a dedicated backup power generator. If you lose power, the Toilet will switch to "battery."

Well then, let me be the first to patent the toilet with bycicle pedals: good for fitness, keeping you in shape _AND_ generating it's own electricity!

I'll be rich!

Re:Power outages

[foreverdisillusioned]

You can't flush the toilet if the power's off and you have an electric water pump (such is the case with people on well water or people above floor X in a building.)

Re:Power outages

[Anonymous Coward]

There are public restrooms in some government buildings here (State Library on 2nd and Monroe), and I've seen them in restaraunts, and the Wal Mart has one, with motion sensing flushes and motion sensing faucets. You would not be able to flush one of these without electricity.

NO WAY would I have one of these at home! Last March when the tornados hit and half the utility poles in town were knocked down, I was without electricity for nearly a week. I was glad to have a gas water heater and a gas stove! I was wishing for an old fashioned gravity furnace with power pile, as although I have a gas furnace, it needs electricity for the thermostat (the old fashioned gas furnaces produced their own power).

Re:Power outages

[couchslug]

"But I just get the funny feeling that some moron is going to design it so that you literally *can't flush* merely because you lost power."

The nice thing about conventional toilets is that you can bucket-fill the tank and flush at leisure. I live in an area where power outages caused by storms are common, and am not interested in running my generator to flush my toilet.

whoa dude

[Anonymous Coward]

I hope those computers don't run Unix. You don't want that thing to dump core on you.

Japan?

[Anonymous Coward]

I was just in Tokyo and all the toilets in nice places are heated and (you have the option to) squirt warm water up your crack... Not news.

Re:Japan?

[bangenge]

i live in tokyo now, and basically most houses and offices have that. sorry, parent post is right, that's not news here. the great thing about it? the warm seats really help your ass relax. i just don't know though what happens if the power's out.

Re:Japan?

[Anonymous Coward]

I was in Japan 13 years ago and they had this sort of option then!

I swear that one loo I went to would not have looked out of place on the Enterprise. (STNG or later). It had more buttons and lights than you would believe.

Problem was that all the text saying what each button did was in Japanese (of course). I was too frightened to try anything. My wife has a story about turning up the heated seat option by accident when she was first in Japan and burning her home-stay father's arse since he was then next one in to use it.

Toto (the manufactuer) also offered a remote control. I kid you not! What use a remote was I cannot imagine.

Re:Japan?

[Bega]

High-tech toilets aren't always very fun.

I had the questionable honor of getting to experience a 40C degree fever and a very liquid and fiery diarrhea, while being in Hiroshima. So, after a day of being half dead, I decided to go to the hospital. While I was waiting to get in to the doctor's office, I decided to go to the toilet.

It was one of those high-tech toilets. The seat was awfully warm, but it was all good since I was freezing my ass off because of the fever, anyway. So, I took my dump, or whatever you could call it at that point, and was about to leave. "Wait a minute!", I thought for myself. "Where do I flush?"

There were buttons for washing and drying my ass, there were buttons to adjust the temperature of the water, as well as the seat, some buttons even played some awfully nice and catchy music, while another button gave me a toilet flush sound (almost, but not the flush I was wishing for). So finally, I ended up not flushing the toilet, because there wasn't any kind of control for that function to be found. But it might've been me and my fever, I wasn't really thinking clearly back then.

As an afterthought, I feel sorry for the next guy to use the toilet. Most of the high-tech toilets I've used, has had the water level so high that your balls usually touch the water when you sit there. Needless to say, three days account of random digestive byproducts in liquid form mixed into a huge amount of water might account for some nausea for some people. Might just be me.

Yes, I know. "TOO MUCH INFO" etc etc.

Re:Japan?

[The Great Pretender]

In the Hilton in Kuala Lumpur not only do they have electonic toilets, but also a 7 inch LCD built into the shaving mirror. Seems that seeing the giant plasma TV in the bedroom from the bathroom wasn't enough.

Re:Japan?

[Anonymous Coward]

You can see below.

Toilets in Japan
TOTO's first "Washlet" TV-CM(1982)
Oh, it was more than 20 years ago.

Re:Japan?

[braoult]

I have been living in Japan for many years, and I *never* saw toilets without flush. It can be on the wall sometimes, on the floor, but always separated from the "high-tech" part which is *only an add-on*. You buy "washlet", as they call them here, in electronic shops, and just put them on your toilets. They just cannot control the mechanical part which is already there.

I will say the same for paper. Washlet does not prevent paper to be there obviously.

Don't forget something: Japanese people are all ready for a "big" earthquake. They have plenty of water at home, batteries, portable radio, food, candles, etc... They are prepared to fill their bathroom with water if something happens and if they have time to do it. Who could believe they would have toilets which would only work with electric power?

By the way, some friends & family (including my parents and sister) came to Japan during these years. They all came back with washlet in their package and have them now installed in their home.

People who don't like it just don't push the buttons, it is simply an addon.

My 2 JPY.

Re:Japan?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not news.

Dude, the opportunity for a thousand poop jokes is always news on this site.

Re:Japan?

[BiggerBoat]

I have a friend who experienced these for the first time not long ago in a Tokyo hotel. She reported that it was actually quite disconcerting at first to get up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom, sit down on a warm toilet seat and practically jump right back up in fear that "someone else had just been sitting here!" She eventually got used to it though.

Re:Japan?

[BiggerBoat]

A. The article mentions they have been available in Japan for a long time.
B. Now there are at least three companies, including one in San Francisco, trying to market them to Americans.

So the news is not that this is new technology, but that it is now being marketed toward Americans. But you would have known that if you had read the article...

Re:Japan?

[sokoloff]

Well, you were in Hiroshima...

Re:Japan?

[SonicSpike]

"Most of the high-tech toilets I've used, has had the water level so high that your balls usually touch the water when you sit there."

I'm 24 and don't have that problem. You must be much older, eh? ;-)

-1 Troll

[Tablizer]

I guy named goatse once tried Microsoft Crapper 1.0, but the......

Broadband.

[EnsilZah]

Get your broadband enabled toilets today for a quicker download.

Re:Broadband.

[Anonymous Coward]

yes but its the "payload" and the weight of the "packet" going through the "tube" that matters

Oh Shit!

[Tablizer]

it's the Blue Plunger of Death!

Re:Oh Shit!

[Walt Dismal]

And sadly, sales of Microsoft Plunger Bob '95 went into the toilet until Microsoft re-invented it and re-released it as Windows Guaranteed Authentic Dump. But now my toilet won't accept a flush, and tells me my crap has been pirated.

Hold on, I'm expecting a fax....

[koterica]

Seriously, are we THAT dependent? I mean, no offense, but I dont feel a need to have a remote control to wipe my ass. There is really no need. Now, I am not saying tech has no place in the bathroom, I would love a waterproof laptop so I could access /. while in the bath. But really. Soon they will have a fad of how many features your toleit has. Will the seat vibrate when I get a IM? Will It warm up when I get a phone call?

Re:Hold on, I'm expecting a fax....

[bangenge]

nope, i've tried it and it doesn't wipe your ass automatically, but you might wanna wipe up before you start using the spray cuz... well, i really don't want to start explaining, but things WILL get messy if you don't clean up afterward. it's not perfect, but it's a big improvement once you get the hang of it.

Re:Hold on, I'm expecting a fax....

[westlake]

Seriously, are we THAT dependent? I mean, no offense, but I dont feel a need to have a remote control to wipe my ass.

We grow older. In time even the simplest of things become more difficult. The paperless, self-cleaning, toilet begins to look pretty good when the alternative is "assisted living" or nursing home care.

Re:Hold on, I'm expecting a fax....

[x2A]

"I mean, no offense, but I dont feel a need to have a remote control to wipe my ass"

You could make it into a game, have a xbox style controller, a small screen with a crosshair, and computer imagery would replace the brown star with a black hole, where aliens come out and you have to kill kill KILL HAAahaaa.... sorry, a little carried away there... and then of cause, different difficulty levels can be achieved through eating slightly rotten veg.

Then you can use it to get kids to eat their dinner, "if you don't eat, you won't have any aliens to shoot!".

You could get an open source version called AssPire!

Re:Hold on, I'm expecting a fax....

[Oligonicella]

Sorry, but if you cannot even wipe your own ass due to age, you will in all probability not be able to feed yourself properly or numerous other things and will be requiring assisted living anyway.

Re:Hold on, I'm expecting a fax....

[ljw1004]

The water is more hygienic than toilet paper, and with the water jet you end up cleaner. Also it's a godsend for hemmeroids sufferers.

This isn't new

[bblboy54]

I've had webcams in bathr.....
Nevermind, nothing to see here.

Re:This isn't new

[mblase]

I've had webcams in bathr.... Nevermind, nothing to see here.

Your humility is astounding. Or is there something else unusual about you you'd rather not share?

Korean Toilets

[localman]

First off, a warning: this post may have too much information. That said...

Anyone here ever use one of those toilets with the built in ass washer? I visited Seoul a few years back and stayed with in-laws. Their toilet had a little control panel with various symbols on it for male, female, water, wind (no earth or fire, thankfully). I feared it for most of my visit, and never tried it out. Eventually though curiousity got the better of me and i pressed a button after I was done (male water). It made few little mechanical sounds and then a tiny sprayer started shooting warm water into my ass crack. It was so ticklish that I just about jumped off the seat; fumbling around with the controls to get it to stop. Eventually I succeeded, but man that was weird. Despite any potential improvement in hygene, I can't handle the ass tickling fountain thing. But hey, I say try it out sometime if you have the chance.

Cheers.

Re:Korean Toilets

[Anonymous Coward]

On our school trip to Washington, D.C., one of us made the toilet explode at around 2 in the morning, so they moved us to a suite. Said suite had an ass-washer. (It's called a bidet, by the way.)

Granted, ours wasn't built into the toilet, but meh.

Re:Korean Toilets

[RuBLed]

I'm very curious.. no really.. really curious.. have you tried the female option?

Re:Korean Toilets

[TubeSteak]

In many foreign countries, because of the bidet, the plumbing isn't designed to handle wads of toilet paper being flushed.

When I was much younger, I found the idea of water squirting at my ass weird and as a consequence, ended up using the plunger quite frequently.

Eventually, I grew up and got over my fear-of-things-that-are-different and had no more trouble while traveling overseas. Once you get used to it, it's no big deal & is a bit more hygenic than wiping your ass with paper.

Hopefully that wasn't too much information

Re:Korean Toilets

[Patrik_AKA_RedX]

The female option could have the ATR* function. That could be very painful for the male user.

*Automatic Tampon Remover.

Re:Korean Toilets

[Solder Fumes]

It takes a long time in the shower to remove any trace of crap-funk in my ass, even using an unlimited supply of water and soap. Why would a tiny dribble of water be remotely effective?

Re:Korean Toilets

[bangenge]

it's not just a tiny dribble. it's in fact an adjustable spray of water. note to everyone: don't try to go and set it to the max pressure immediately. and in case if you're still wondering if it's effective, up to a certain point, it is. with that said, you better watch your diet otherwise you're gonna have a really messy time.

Re:Korean Toilets

[Kremmy]

Well, how often do you shower compared to how often you shit?
How long do you wait between a shit and a shower?
It's going to be effective because you aren't in the shower scraping dried crap-funk off your ass, you're gently washing away the fresh crap-funk that hasn't had a chance to get ingrained into the landscape. Simple, really.

Re:Korean Toilets

[resonte]

You're obviously not wiping your ass properly... seriously.

Until the age of 14 I allways had the same problems you did, until I figured out it was more affective to wipe my ass from the front while sitting down (ie your hand goes between your legs, under the scrotom and wipes the ass).

The other method (wiping from the back) has the problem of wiping the poo into your ass pubic hairs and thus getting stuck there.

Whereas wiping from the front, you eliminate the problem from the source (so to say)....Try it :)

Re:Korean Toilets

[fbjon]

The female option sprays further forward. There's sometimes also an oscillating option, to give an all-round wash.

Always read the manual.

Re:Korean Toilets

[initialE]

Lucky you didn't try the automated tampon remover.

Re:Korean Toilets

[bokutoe]

I have never laughed so hard at a series of threads on /. in my entire life...!!

Re:Korean Toilets

[localman]

Honestly, it wasn't the weirdness or fear-of-the-different that I had a problem with. It was the tickling. If it didn't tickle so damn much I'd probably be down with it. I'm guessing it didn't tickle you that much. It certainly didn't tickle my wife that much.

One theory (here I again risk too much information) is that it tickles more if you have more ass hair. I won't get into details why I've formulated that theory. But I will note that Koreans have, on average, much less body hair than caucasians.

Cheers.

Re:Korean Toilets

[localman]

Actually... I had some practical questions about the bidet. I've enjoyed travelling overseas many times (don't assume that being amused by differences precludes appreciation and acceptance of a culture). But I admit that I've not tried the standard European bidet. What I don't understand is how it is actually used. The ones I remember looked simply like a low sink. Does one fill it with water and then manually splash the water on themselves? Does one actually touch the affected area? Does one do this before, after, or instead of using paper?

Cheers.

Re:Korean Toilets

[SonicSpike]

"Despite any potential improvement in hygene, I can't handle the ass tickling fountain thing."

I hear the gay guys love it! ;-)

Re:Korean Toilets

[Solder Fumes]

My brown-eye has been opened!

Windows PEE

[kihjin]

Just look out for the Bad Smell of Dookie when this shit hits the "C-P-U" fan (literally).

Anyone want to work on a Toilet Linux? Toilux?

Hack It Now !

[Vortex_ICS]

I am sure a hack will be available at the end of the week, it's just matter of time.

Re:Hack It Now !

[Anonymous Coward]

"Hack Your Crack!"
 
Well, at least its not as lame as "Hack The Planet."

Case mod's beat us too it

[Tablizer]

http://www.envador.com/cases/ToiletPC/

Interface improvements

[z4pp4]

Seriously though, there are some things whose design has absolutely been optimized to a point where it would take a revolution in technology to make any changes worth while.

Think like a programmer! You can always improve the interface to be more user friendly.

Re:Interface improvements

[nmb3000]

Think like a programmer! You can always improve the interface to be more user friendly.

Holy crap! (Pardon the pun). A few modifications and this thing could be your workstation chair. Really kick those coding marathons into high-gear!

"Buy 50 cases of Bawls and get a GreatJohn office chair for half off!" Coming soon to ThinkGeek.

New meaning to accident in the toilet

[syousef]

Geek 1: I heard you were in hospital. What happened?
Geek 2: My computer froze then fried my penis.
Geek 1: Oh well at least it wasn't anything vital
Geek 2: Normally yeah, but I'd just signed up for 2 years of penthouse.com

Re:New meaning to accident in the toilet

[William Robinson]

LMAO,

reminds me of a joke....

A man traveling by plane was in urgent need of a restroom facility. But each time he tried, it was occupied. The flight attendant, aware of his predicament, suggested he use the attendant's ladies room, but cautioned him not to press any of the buttons.

There next to the paper roll were four buttons marked: WW WA PP ATR. Making the mistake soooo many geeks make out of curiosity, he disregarded what she said when his curiosity got the best of him. He carefully pressed the WW button and immediately a gentle flush of Warm Water sprayed on his bare bottom.

He thought "Wow" these gals really have it nice!! So a little more boldly he pressed the WA button and body temperature Warm Air blew across his wet bottom and dried it comfortably. "aha" he thought, "no wonder these women take so long in the bathroom with these kinds of services!" So he pushed the next button PP with anticipation. A soft disposable Powder Puff swung below him and dusted his bottom lightly with talc. "Man, this is great," he thought as he reach out for the ATR button.

When he awoke in the hospital, the morphine was just wearing off...confused he buzzed the nurse to find out what happened. He explained the last thing he remembered was intense pain in the ladies room on the plane. The nurse explained, "Yes, you must have been having a great time until you pushed the Automatic Tampon Removal button. By the way, your penis is under your pillow."

Are they reaaly big in Japan?

[jumpingfred]

You always here about this sort of crazy Japanese shit. But do the Japanese really buy this crap in any sort of volume?

Re:Are they reaaly big in Japan?

[slash.dt]

You always here about this sort of crazy Japanese shit. But do the Japanese really buy this crap in any sort of volume?

Sure, most homes have them in Tokyo. We just moved to new apartment which doesn't have one and my wife is hassling me to go and get one asap.

Re:Are they reaaly big in Japan?

[Ambidisastrous]

There's a lot of weird shit floating around the Pacific Rim.

We occasionally see these things in the U.S., and while I've never had the balls (for fear of losing them) to try all the features of the pimp-my-throne when I see one, I know they have a certain cache' and are at least a significant presence in general. But beyond that, lemme tell you about the squatting pan. Terminal : Desktop :: Squatting pan : Toilet. It's just a shallow porcelain basin in the ground, with a drain and some inlet for water to flush.

Freaked the shit outta me... which I guess was the point.

Re:Are they reaaly big in Japan?

[.smoke]

I'm actually in Japan right now, for business. Even my teeny little hotel room has one in the bathroom. It took me quite a while to realise that none of those little buttons actually flushes the toilet. That, thankfully, is still mechanical. A power outage would really suck, otherwise.

Re:Are they reaaly big in Japan?

[El Puerco Loco]

japan has had them for quite a while. i encountered one in a restaurant in kanazawa nearly 20 years ago in 1987. never having seen a computer-controlled toilet before, and unable to read japanese, i had a hell of a time trying to figure out how to flush the thing. after trying several of the buttons, heard a strange robot noise coming from the bowl. never having heard robot noises coming from a toilet bowl, i naturally jumped up to see just what the hell was going on and was promptly squirted in the face by the retractable bidet. the travel books had all warned about the hole-in-the-floor squat type commodes, but not about the automatic ass washing robot type.

Re:Are they reaaly big in Japan?

[Joel from Sydney]

Yes - my girlfriend is currently living in a small town in rural Japan, and even her house has a heated toilet seat.

Vapooh-rize it...

[foniksonik]

Seriously, where is the solid/liquid waste sanitizer that will be self-cleaning, self-disposing, etc.... I'd love to pay a little more on electric bill and get rid of my sewage costs and reduce my water needs... make it a recycling unit that outputs fertilizer for my yard even better (after blasting it with UV rays of course), maybe even mixing it in to a cistern of water that is used to feed my sprinklers with an herbicide pellet thrown in once a month to boot.

Where's my smart house that is smart about everyday things... forget the 'avatar' that tells me stock prices or whatever, just make it a more efficient house please.

Re:Vapooh-rize it...

[Baloo Ursidae]

I'd love to pay a little more on electric bill and get rid of my sewage costs and reduce my water needs...

You're obviously not a victim of California and their refusing to pay for the electricity they didn't pay for after they unanimously voted that they would pay for electric at any price. Electric's spendy near but not in California thanks to that fuckup. Would be nice if when California screws up, only Californians are screwed, instead of everybody in a 1000 mile radius of California that isn't in California...

Re:Vapooh-rize it...

[Anonymous Coward]

I live in Washington State, well within 1000 miles of California. We have more electrictiy then we know what to do with. All that extra electricty gets sold to California, lowering our costs. (Our electricity is generated by the BPA, which is a nonprofit.) In fact, Washington and most other areas around California Have the Lowest Prices for Electricity in the United States!

Re:Vapooh-rize it...

[amias]

You don't need electricity for that , nature will do it for you.
http://compostingtoilet.org/news/000429.php

there is a prize for anyone who can watch the whole 23 mins without smirking.

Toodle-pip
Amias

Re:Vapooh-rize it...

[Brickwall]

Electric's spendy near but not in California thanks to that fuckup

English talking very much?

Re:Vapooh-rize it...

[Atacama93]

I have an incinerating toilet at my cabin that uses no water. Just an awe inspiring 1200 degree F incineration compartment for reducing solid waste to a teaspoon of ash. Up in the mountains, you often don't have the option of a sewage hookup or even a septic tank. Composting toilets can also work, but the smell tends to be stronger than what the inicinerating toilet emits.

There's no automatic mechanism for dumping the ash out in the yard, but the manufacturer's brochure assures me that it is safe to do so manually. Of course, there's a lot of other questionable material in the brochure.

Hmmm, maybe I should take it to Burning Man.

Moo

[Chacham]

I welcome Gnu inventions, that help with free time.

I means, it's used in the stall, man.

Better that you nix the rest of this post. before it gets really bad.

Additional note.

[EnsilZah]

Forgot to mention it's speficially designed for Pee-er-to-Pee-er use.

Re:Additional note.

[Joel from Sydney]

I hope it's optimised for streaming media!

Re:Additional note.

[dotgain]

No, it doesn't have very good multicast support.

Bad idea all around

[honkycat]

As bathrooms become more upscale and luxurious, a digital toilet fits right in.

No, no it doesn't.

LiveToilet

[Anonymous Coward]

I can only imagine the low-end blog posts created by such a device.

current mood: uunnnggghhh

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:Broadband. Save the Toilets!

[kihjin]

Actually, it's not the "down stream" of water we need to worry about. It's the Quality of Shit we want to "upload."

Basically, the waterco's want to charge us depending on the types of poo we upload.

Larger poo clogs the infrastructure. Where will these companies acquire the funding to upgrade it? They have no choice but to charge the source of the "content." People like you and me.

Time to buy more apple cider. Save the Toilets!

American?

[opusman]

I think you'll find most of the western world (and a good percentage of the rest) uses the same sort of toilet as you do. And given that the flush toilet was invented in London, calling it an "American" commode seems a trifle parochial.

It is the INTERnet, you know...

Re:American?

[Psychotria]

I am from Australia. One of the first things that struck me when I first visited America was the amount of water in the toilet. Now, I don't know whether or not it's just that American toilets store the water in the bowl, whereas in Australia it's stored in the cistern (tank above toilet), but the American toilets did have much more water for my pooh to fall into. I still haven't worked out if this is a good or bad thing. With more water there is less chance for your pooh to stick to the sides and embaress the next person, but more chance for evil toilet water to splasg into your bum.

Re:American?

[ericdano]

Oh, and did you notice the water spins the other way up here? Cool huh?

Yes, but does it run Linux?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, but does it run Linux?

hidden!!!

[b1ufox]

I hope they dont put a hidden webcam somewhere ;) ...

Afterall who is going to check under toilet seats in such a hurry .... :D

Cost

[Mantrid42]

Mmmm, yeah... I'm not in the habit of taking technology worth thousands and SHITTING IN IT.

Re:Cost

[Gleng]

You must not work for Symantec then.

Well

[osho_gg]

At least it is not a Zero Gravity Toilet!!

Osho

Re:Well

[revolu7ion]

or an iToilet... (groan)

been done

[lazd.net]

Men have been so lucky to have digital toilets for years now. I wonder if they gather statistics...

"In soviet russia, toilets flush you!" or...

[ruedesursulines]

"News for nerds that never went to Japan"

I used one of these computerized toilets at a friend's house in Japan way back in 1997.

Hey, did you know you can now buy a robotic dog too??? WOW!!!!!!!!!!

Re:"In soviet russia, toilets flush you!" or...

[AndyboyH]

Thankyou, someone needed to say it. (about Japan, not the Soviet Russia meme)

The Toilet...

[monoqlith]

is the most evolved piece of human machinery, if you measure evolution in the years it has existed in any form at all. Contrary to popular belief, cleansing your colon into a hole is the world's oldest occupation, not prostitution. You might have thought it was prostitution, but you are wrong. It's making cleveland steamers in a ditch.

So I'm confused about this article. On the one hand, I'm pretty sure nobody's made any noticable improvements to bathroom equipment (toilet paper, plungers, sink, soap, etc) for however many years because maybe, dare I say it, it's one of a select few pieces of technology that we have that's done, perfect, finito in a design sense. It's reached a critical point of punctuated equilibrium in its development. All change after this point is slow and arbitrary.

This may of course be shortsighted, but I think this is a good thing. I for one don't like to think about releasing the hostages(although, like anyone, I find it momentarily pleasing when it happens) or even attach all that meaning to it, and so the fact that the current equipment renders the process as unceremonious, functional and utilitarian makes everything in the room just what it should be: perfectly forgettable. I think baking the brownies is gross, and so now that we have mastered our bathroom thrones we can move onto a prettier stage in human evolution: the one where we forget about our logs.

On the other hand, perhaps innovation in the bathroom should continue. I know there are plenty of embarassing things that happen in public bathrooms. Urinal separators could stand some improvement, and toilet paper dispensers need to be more automated and less frustrating when the roll runs out. I know it's really agonizing when you have been sitting there for ten minutes, you are missing a meeting or are in the middle of an exam, you have one sheet of two ply left to split among your cheeks, and you can't get the f-ing next roll to come down so you can squeegee your butt and skidaddle. Perhaps someone can innovate on noise blockers so someone with gastrointestinal stress won't have to wait till everyone who heard their noise pollution(or smelled their olefactory pollution) to leave before exiting stage front out of the stall and washing their hands. Boy those are some awkward moments

But one thing's for sure: whoever comes up with a successful, widely applicable way to improve bathroom technology is a genius. And to that person: please come along soon and making sinking the Bismarck even more enjoyable.

I have to take a crap.

Re:The Toilet...

[ericdano]

Noise cancelling technology in a stall. Great idea. Go and file a patent for it. You can have like little sensors in the toliet seat. They hear a noise, and speakers on the 4 corners of the stall will cancel it out. Now that would be a good innovation....if it was cheap.

A paper dispensor with WiFi that would notify building maintenance that they need to fix the problem. Great idea. You could do something like that with maybe the volume of water in the toliet. If it reaches a point that is too high, it shuts off the water intake and uses WiFi to notify the proper people again.

The article refers to a wand to clean areas. Yeah, no thanks. Who says the wand is clean? Same for the air blower. Do these things get cleaned? How? Can you imagine the blower blowing stuff back up.....yikes! This

At least with TP I can see it is clean.......

Re:The Toilet...

[Anonymous Coward]

While the previous post by monoqlith was Score 3: Interesting,
it should have been Score 5: Funny....
but it must be because I liked his toilet humor...
or maybe it was his dirty talk:
    cleansing your colon
    making cleveland steamers in a ditch
    releasing the hostages
    baking the brownies
    sinking the Bismarck

Re:The Toilet...

[monoqlith]

Thank you for noticing the point of the post. In fact I'm insulted by the moderation..the whole point was to sprinkle as many euphemisms for pooping as I could remember into a post that could otherwise conceivably be confused for a +1 interesting or insightful.

Of course I forgot the most important one: "Dropping the kids off at the pool."

Re:The Toilet...

[MWoody]

"Contrary to popular belief, cleansing your colon into a hole is the world's oldest occupation, not prostitution."

You... you get paid for it? How do... No, never mind. I don't want to know.

Listen up, people

[Anonymous Crowhead]

If your defecation is so out of control that you need a $1000 toilet to help stay "fresh", then maybe you should address your diet. If everytime you have a sit down you end up with explosive shit-chunks plastered all over you nether regions, then SOMETHING IS WRONG. If you need a computer-assisted washdown, you are a sick animal. You need to get your fat ass out of the Taco Bell line and down to the produce aisle of your local grocery store, stat.

This bidet garbage was invented when contaminated water gave everyone a daily dose of the runs. You should not need it today. If you do, you are unhealthy.

Re:Listen up, people

[bblboy54]

Obviously you have never been here in Northern Virginia.

Re:Listen up, people

[rtyall]

But then again if you go travelling and end up in a foreign country where the mineral content of water is sufficiently different, then you'll end up with the squits and the Bidet seems like a much nicer invention all of a sudden.

Re:Listen up, people

[morie]

actually, the bidet was not invented to wash your behind, but as a preservative, used to wash out semen after copulation and thereby prevent conception. It then developed into an asswasher.

Re:Listen up, people

[MidnightBrewer]

Don't knock it until you try it. There's nothing like coming out of a bathroom feeling as clean as when you went in. Next we'll be sneering at people who use showers when they know darn well that they're just going to be dirty again by tomorrow. Despite all the things Americans have invented technology-wise, we're still Luddites compared to the rest of the world. Go figure.

Re:Listen up, people

[kraada]

I suffer from Crohn's Disease, along with approximately half a million other Americans. To summarize: Crohn's is an autoimmune disease of the digestive tract which causes inflammation in various places. When you have inflammation in your intestines, that part of the intestine cannot reabsorb liquid.

I don't have a bad case. But there are some horror stories out there: people who have to go 10-20 times a day, people who end up needing permanent ileostomies (a surgical bypass of the end of the intestines), etc.

Even with my relatively mild case, I have to take three Sitz Baths a day, two showers a day, and cleaning up after I go is not fun on top of that.

This toilet seat? Sounds like it would be fantastic for me and others like me. It could probably save me 20 minutes a day, at least. If my health insurance covered it, or I could afford the thing, I'd buy one tomorrow. Seriously.

And one in 350 people in America have this problem along with me. And the numbers are rising. (The disease was unheard of pre-20th Century -- not from lack of diagnostic methods, from lack of existing. There's a growth curve that is followed in developing countries; a Crohn's specialist I spoke to said that there are varioius studies underway to figure out what parts of our diet changed enough to create such an outbreak -- he hinted at processed sugar being a leading candidate. Unfortunately I lack a citation here, but the head of the Crohn's & Colitis center at Mass General seems like a pretty good source to me.)

I can see these things selling very, very well if they can bring the price point down just a tad, or convince health insurance to cover it for people in scenarios like mine (even partially).

So, yeah, I'm unhealthy -- but it's not my fault, and one of these things could make quite a difference.

Re:Listen up, people

[jez9999]

Actually, I suspect the reason the French and the like need a bidet is because of the bizarre 'shit plinth' design of European toilets, which seems like a much more messy affair than UK/US toilets with water in the bowl. They should really make their toilet design more sensible, but noo... nous etes Francais!!!

Re:Listen up, people

[jez9999]

So, yeah, I'm unhealthy -- but it's not my fault

I don't wish to be mean, but if this is caused by a lousy diet, surely it is.

Re:Listen up, people

[Belgand]

A while back in Wired (I believe this was around '95-'97 or so) one of their standard features (Future Watch IIRC) consisted of brief blurbs from various relevant parties about technology that may or may not be available in the future and when (or if) they thought it would come to pass or become commonplace in the USA.

One of the blurbs from this was about when bidets (and since it was Wired they're probably hoping we'll assume this means computerized auto-bidets such as seen in various Japanese models) has stuck with me for a long time because of the essential rightness of the thought behind it, essentially the quote was: "I've never understood how Americans will fastidiously wash their hands after going to the bathroom, yet are content to merely use a handful of wadded paper on their bottoms."

Why indeed? From a rational point of view is it not the clean, hygenic, and proper thing to do? No more crude "wiping" for me. I want my ass washed, dried, and factory-fresh when I get up from my comfortable, lightly-padded seat.

Eliminating is already unpleasant enough, why continue to make it worse than needs to be?

Re:Listen up, people

[aschoeff]

Have you tried probiotics?

Re:Listen up, people

[QMO]

Considering that I regularly, without gloves, shake hands with people, open doors and use phones and keyboards that are used by others, but have yet to touch a stranger's bare butt, I don't find it at all strange that washing hands is considered more necessary to hygine than washing the rear end.

So, since I'm not even going to see your butt, let alone touch it, as long as I can't smell it, I don't care if you wash it.

Re:Listen up, people

[TheDugong]

"use phones and keyboards that are used by others, but have yet to touch a stranger's bare butt" Well, this is slashdot after all.

Re:Listen up, people

[ajs318]

There is definitely something in that. I was talking to a woman friend a few years ago and she mentioned she was experimenting with reusable alternatives to sanitary towels and tampons. Natural sea sponges are good and absorbent but they're also made from dead animals; foam rubber artificial sponges are less absorbent; cotton terry towelling is bulky. The conversation eventually got turned around to "Could you eat a diet that gave you all the nutrients your body required and also eliminated, or at least minimised your use of toilet paper?"

I don't think either of us ever tried a TP-free diet in earnest, and I've lost touch with her since then.

Re:Listen up, people

[Luyseyal]

I have a buddy with Crohn's. He smokes "probiotics" all the time. Helps him with food quite a bit.
-l

Re:Listen up, people

[Anonymous Coward]

It can't be a lousy diet. My uncle has Crohn's very bad. When he was diagnosed, he was a high school track star and was in prime condition. Now he is very frail and probably weighs less than 100 lbs and is dying of small bowel cancer. He is only 43.

Re:Listen up, people

[Scaba]

So, if you accidentally grabbed a pile of shit with your hands, you'd be perfectly OK just wiping them clean with some toilet paper, forgoing the sink, water and soap? And who are you, so wise in the ways of science, that you know what others do and do not need?

Re:Listen up, people

[Strategos]

For the gay community it doubles as both.

Re:Listen up, people

[Anonymous Coward]

While refined sugar may play a part, and while IANAGIS (Gastro Intestinal Specialist)

It seems to me that what you need are worms. Only in the last 90 years have people started living without our own personal internal zoo. And our immune systems evolved to deal with that zoo.

As you put it, Crohn's disease is an autoimmune disorder. Your immune system evolved to attack things in your GI tract, And with nothing there to fight, just like bored soldiers, they find something to attack, and in this case, it's your GI tract itself.

the human race evolved with parasites, and well, it's no wonder that when we remove an integral part of our evolutionary history that there are unintentional side effects.

Re:Listen up, people

[morie]

not sure you've got the concept of conception down...

Re:Listen up, people

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, according to The Great Wiki, that is a misconception created by American soldiers during WWII. They first encountered bidets in European brothels, leading them to the assumption that they were designed for douching. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bidet

Re:Listen up, people

[JunkmanUK]

classic: Funny and insightful... we need a new mod system for this single post...

and also, I want my toilet to work without needing a UPS during a powercut... maybe it's just me but sometimes when you gotta go, you gotta go...

Re:Listen up, people

[Anonymous Coward]

Have you tried Digestive Advantage for Crohn's Disease?

http://www.ganedenbiotech.com/index.php?page=DAIBD

Re:Listen up, people

[teridon]

May you and your children be cursed with a 1000 hemorrhoids!!

Re:Listen up, people

[TommydCat]

On this note, I'm strangely amused by those people that yell at someone leaving a bathroom without washing their hands, but themselves do not wash before touching their own junk. When I think of bascarts in stores, grimey airport terminals, shaking hands at a meeting with people you don't know...

Don't we have this whole thing backwards? "Don't touch that, you don't know where it's been!" Yet, I know where it's been more than where my hands have been...

Re:Listen up, people

[wirefarm]

I live in Japan and when we bought our apartment, they installed a new toilet and Toto washlet. I thought it a bit over the top at first, but now would miss it if I had to go back to a featureless seat.

When they were first introduced I think in the mid 1970's, the first commercial showed a pretty girl squirting a big blob of blue paint across her hand and then trying to wipe it clean with tissue. For maximum shock value, they ran the commercials at dinner time and though there were plenty of complaints from viewers, the mental image stuck and sales took off. There was a really good program here in Japan called "Project X" on NHK that told the whole story of the development and engineering of the things, including how the engineers had to find "shameless" women willing to be measured for adjusting the spray and such...

Another time, I saw an interview with "Kin-san" and "Gin-san" a pair of 100-plus-year-old twin sisters--they asked them what they thought was the most amazing technological advancement made during their lifetimes and they answered "heated toilet seats."

The thing is, these things are a lot cleaner. As far as bathroom hygiene goes, the more clean people are decreases the chances of things like Escherichia coli infections, Cryptosporidium infections, Giardiasis, Shigellosis and Viral gastroenteritis. Not just you, but also the people who prepare your food, take care of you in the hospital, care for your children, anywhere there is human contact. Ever get a "24 hour stomach virus" or food poisoning? It's likely because someone who handled something that you ate didn't wash their hands after going "number two." In other words, you got sick because you ate their poo.

So, where you can't imagine that anyone but an unhealthy, lazy slob might want one of these, perhaps it's just a matter of different priorities?

Re:Listen up, people

[sckeener]

So, yeah, I'm unhealthy -- but it's not my fault

I don't wish to be mean, but if this is caused by a lousy diet, surely it is.

I guess he could stop eating. I am faced with that choice frequently. It hurts to eat. It is similar to food allergies...you have no clue what is in what you are eating. Playing russian roulette isn't always fun. I usually eat a ton when I know I am in a safe place to suffer....such as at home...thus when I am out people always get mad because I didn't eat very much. Well, you wouldn't eat very much if you knew 20 minutes after you did, you'd be spending 4 hours in the toliet in pain.

Re:Listen up, people

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, my defecation does not seem wrong, but I wouldn't dream going to bed with my wife (or with anybody) without using the bidet first, except if I've just had a shower. And I expect the same from her.
But then yes, I'm french...and we are a notoriously hygienically challenged people...but with shiny arses.

Re:Listen up, people

[ajnsue]

washing after defecating is the traditional method. It is only in the recent industrial era that paper has become cheap enough to use to wipe yourself. And in most of asia a handspray mounted to the wall adjacent to the toilet is the only hygenic *tool* you will find in most toilets. There is paper provided in hotels and some offices just for the consideration of Westerners and their wierd wasteful defecation rituals. Note: you have all heard of the practice of never touching someone with your left hand in Asian/Arab cultures. Well guess why? Some folks in that region do find it repulsive that people eat with the same hand they wipe their a** with.

Re:Listen up, people

[supermank17]

Wow, you're a real idiot. Read up on Crohn's disease sometime. It's a chronic, possibly autoimmune disease, and a lousy diet has nothing to do with it. Yes, eating a "bland" diet can help reduce the severity of the symptoms, but the symptoms are still there, and are still nasty. One of my roommates in college had Crohn's. It didn't matter what he ate, he still had to spend lots of time in the bathroom. Heaven help him if he ate something dairy related, or that was remotely hard to digest (mints were especially bad for some reason). And when he had flare-ups, it meant taking steroids and other nasty stuff in addition to the 15 pills he normally took daily.

So no, it's definitely not his fault.

Re:Listen up, people

[ncc74656]

It is only in the recent industrial era that paper has become cheap enough to use to wipe yourself. And in most of asia a handspray mounted to the wall adjacent to the toilet is the only hygenic *tool* you will find in most toilets. There is paper provided in hotels and some offices just for the consideration of Westerners and their wierd wasteful defecation rituals. Note: you have all heard of the practice of never touching someone with your left hand in Asian/Arab cultures. Well guess why? Some folks in that region do find it repulsive that people eat with the same hand they wipe their a** with.

Is it our fault that they refuse to move into at least the 20th century? T.P. is cheap and reliable. Unlike these fancy electronic seats described in TFA, there's nothing in T.P. to break. It's certainly cleaner than wiping with your bare hand...I don't care who you are, that's just disgusting.

Given the wonderful cultural practices of certain of the groups you enumerated (killing rape victims for the "crime" of having been raped, killing people who've come to the realization that the dominant "religion" in their neck of the woods is a crock of shit, strapping explosives onto people and sending them into schools, restaurants, and public transit, flying airplanes into skyscrapers, etc.), I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that their toilet habits are likewise stuck in the 7th century.

Besides, the last thing I'd want when taking a dump is for the damn seat to...um...crap out on me.

Re:Listen up, people

[Deadstick]

Gas station johns on the German/Austrian Autobahn have self-cleaning seats. You put a one-euro coin in a slot to get in. When you get up off the biffy, it flushes itself; then a mechanical arm swings down with a rotary brush and a sprayer. The sprayer spritzes, the brush spins, and the seat slowly rotates 360 degrees. When you open the door, a slot spits out a receipt that you can use to get your one euro back if you buy anything.

rj

Re:Listen up, people

[carpal_tunneler]

not only is TP unhygienic (ummm let's see, do you wash your hands with a dry towel when they're dirty?) it's god-awful for the environment. for example:

If every household in the U.S replaced just one 4-pack of 500 sheet virgin fiber bathroom tissues with 100% recycled ones, we could save:

1.2 million trees
5.1 million cubic feet of landfill space, equal to over 5000 full garbage trucks
537 million gallons of water, a year's supply for over 15,300 families of four

not to mention eliminate/reduce the need for dioxin, a harmful bleach derivative that's used to insure that the paper you wipe your pristine ass with is nice and white.

honestly, your attitude perfectly illustrates everything that's wrong with this country:

1) ignorant of facts
2) yet arrogant in spite of #1
3) hyper-critical of things you don't understand
4) self-centered and self-serving

and - worst of all - stereotyping, anglocentric, fear/hate-mongering.

please crawl back under the rock from whence you came.

cheers,
ct

Re:Listen up, people

[QuickFox]

If I understand this webpage correctly your problem should disappear or be greatly relieved if you simply squatted.

Re:Listen up, people

[morie]

eh true. "preservatief" is an oldfashioned dutch word for contraceptive, so this is a case of bad translation

Re:Listen up, people

[Anonymous Coward]

It can't be a lousy diet. My uncle has Crohn's very bad. When he was diagnosed, he was a high school track star and was in prime condition. Now he is very frail and probably weighs less than 100 lbs and is dying of small bowel cancer. He is only 43.

That sounds like the guy who wrote this book.

I got turned onto it when I was hunting for stuff that might help with my IBS. The author had all kinds of trouble despite trying many variations on healthy diets that were supposed to help him. Of course he is selling his particular brand of Probiotic supplements, but that turned out to be what I was after anyhow. I had noticed that eating yogurt with active cultures helped despite my otherwise crappy diet, in addition to the metamucil wafers my doctor had prescribed. It seemed that the yogurt obviated the need for the fiber, which I had been afraid was masking something else.

The probiotic supplement helped a lot, and seems to put things back to normal for me. I realize IBS != Crohn's but as the author of the book did have Crohn's it makes sense that the right kind of dietary changes could help a lot. It's just that it's hard to find the right stuff and there are complex problems when it comes to diet. What works for one will not necessarily work for another and you have to consider food allergies, etc.

I think that antibiotics, pesticides, etc. are a factor as well as all the artificial food we eat. The modern diet is not healthy in any regard no matter how "healthy" your diet is. If you're buying your food at the store, you're filling yourself with additives, preservatives, chemicals and poisons. I don't doubt this is a major part of why we are having all these weird ailments now. At the same time we have made these advances in order to correct other problems. The answer will have to be to move forward with some changes that balance out the damage we have done.

Re:Listen up, people

[LRBenson]

It was interesting to see you post this here.. kind of caught me by suprise to be honest. I was diagnosed with Chrons almost 2 years ago when I went into the hospital for what I thought was going to be having my appendix removed. Woke up the next day to find out 7 inches of my small intestine had been removed right above my colon. I have a moderate case and honestly don't take as much care of it as I should outside of taking the one medication they have me on. I do have to frequent the bathroom anywhere from 5-15 times in a day and can feel you when you say it's sometimes just easier not to eat. According to my gastro doc, malnutrition is one of the biggest obstacles to deal with involving crohns patients. To stay slightly on topic, I don't know or think in my particular case that an automated butt cleaning toilet would help... Although, a gentle water cleansing might be a little nicer as opposed to what can sometimes feel like a worn out, calloused, sore butt0. Anyway, good luck with everything in dealing with this as I know I need a little luck to get through almost everyday.

MOD PARENT TMI!

[Deviant Q]

Too much informative :-P

What if it crashes?

[Bimkins]

Do you get a BSOD?
(Brown Shit of Death)

washlets are better

[m4c north]

Yes, here in Japan the 'washlet' is very popular. You'll find it in most department stores, restaurants, and houses. However, in train stations and public spaces, you'll find the opposite end of the spectrum: washiki - the squatter. It's arguably the cleanest since you don't actually touch anything (no seat, no bum sweat residue, no stray hair, ...). The first go is a challenge though: a delicate balance between, well, balance and positioning.

I prefer the 'dirty' washlets.

it's weird

[dubiousmike]

I read the article and the author seemed to have trouble saying, "why in the world would you buy this?" And really.... is a heated toilet seat with a built in bidet worth at least $800? He says the dryer on it is worthless. I wonder why they wouldn't have linked to a review of a techy seat that actually worked? The seat isn't worth the money and the article says so. B-O-R-I-N-G

I live in a town that is 80% Portuguese and so many homes have bidets in them. You don't need a seat that will only allow water usage if there is over 30 lbs. You simply beat your kid within an inch of his or her life if they turn on the bidet and get water all over the floor. The rest of the kids will never make the same mistake.

Never mind that most men have no desire to douche themselves after taking a crap...

Good. no skid marks, no crack bacteria...

[cute-boy]

(Well this one brought out a predicable response of teenage/geek humour....)

This can only be a good thing. The should give you a grant install on in every home.

I have had a bidet for years, love it, plumbed in but doesn't need to be powered... love my ass being CLEAN. If your ass is properly clean you can dry it with a towel.

I ride my bike 20km every day - anyone who rides a bike for more than a few KM per day knows what a problem bacteria and sweaty ass cracks can me.

I swim 1.5km every day... I'd like to think that other users of the pool keep their asses clean too.

Well actually I'd like to think everone keeps their ass clean whatever. It's just a nicer way to think about people...

-R

Re:Good. no skid marks, no crack bacteria...

[Anonymous Coward]

So after 21.5km of travel each day do you have a 3m shit?

Re:Good. no skid marks, no crack bacteria...

[cute-boy]

Ah I notice you responds as Anonymous Coward when it comes to discussion of cleans asses.

-R

"Mixer taps"

[QuantumG]

also known as the single knob faucet. What was wrong with double knob faucets? Nothing, but these mixer tap things are everywhere.

Re:"Mixer taps"

[fbjon]

Double-knobs are harder to control temperature-wise. It doesn't remember the last temperature setting, so you need to tweak it every time.

Re:"Mixer taps"

[QuantumG]

Maybe your mixer tap is different to mine, but I've never had one that remembers the last setting. On the other hand, I'm not a retard and can easily configure the desired tempurature of water from a faucet.

Re:"Mixer taps"

[Danga]

And who cares what the tempature of the water that is flushing your last piss and/or shit is? Must be a European thing...

Re:"Mixer taps"

[jsiren]

Yep, it's largely a matter of preference. In a faucet you have two variables: temperature and pressure. I've seen three basic types of mixer taps:

1. Separate controls for the components' (i.e. hot and cold water) pressure. The sum of the pressures determines pressure, the difference determines temperature. This is the simplest type. Both controls must be set separately every time you want any water, unless one can be left at zero.
2. Separate controls for the variables, i.e. one knob for pressure (sum) and one for temperature (difference). This is convenient for a shower faucet, where the temperature control can be left in a suitable position and the pressure control adjusted as necessary. (Some people save water by not running the shower while shampooing, for example.)
3. One control (lever) for both variables, the horizontal axis providing temperature adjustment and the vertical axis pressure control. This can be controlled with one hand and adjusted with a single motion. These are sometimes used in showers, but there I find them a nuisance since it's too easy to brush on the lever and get boiled or frozen... Lever-style faucets are common in hospitals (at least in this corner of the globe) because they can be operated by pressing the handle with the wrist or elbow, not with the hand that's just been washed, risking recontamination from the handle.

What is not a mixer tap is the English-style two-tap arrangement, where you have two streams of water, one boiling hot, one freezing cold, and they only get mixed into a nice warm stream once they reach the drain...

from the Department of Useless Information

what I, and the NSA want to know is this

[1800maxim]

does the toilet keep logs of your activity?

Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, I'll be here all night.

Re:what I, and the NSA want to know is this

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually I've read about special toilets for sick/elderly people here in Japan that will analyze your crap and send the information to your doctor. Eg. activity logging toilets exist.

Ecology?

[Virtual_Raider]

Yeah, it might save some trees from being flushed down the toilet, but insted it proposes to waste a much more valuable and scarce resource: fresh water. In case you haven't noticed there is a worldwide shortage of fresh water building up. I grew up in a city with water shortages where during a several-years-long dry spell you would get running water only 5 hours per day tops, regarless of socioeconmic standing. Now I moved to another hemisphere and guess what? same problems check this out for only one example . Ain't just my luck... Anyway, I would think that new technologies should start to take into account not only current conditions but long-term viability. In my opinion it would make more sense to keep using paper but get it not from trees but from marihua... er, hemp.

Re:Ecology?

[ericdano]

This needs to be modded way up. Yeah, if everyone in L.A. got one of these, Northern California would be in a crap (pun intended).

There hasn't been a huge drought in California in a long while. I remember as a kid the water rationing we had.

Wouldn't it be better just to have better, biodegradible toliet paper? Or recycled TP? Or something? Sea weed? Organic?

Is this toilet made by Microsoft? Run Windows......oh....it's all starting to make sense now.

Re:Ecology?

[vidarh]

Water is easier to fully recycle. Many places already have water treatment plants that return water that is cleaner than what went into the water supply in the first place. Toilet paper is the last cycle for paper recycling, for obvious reasons.

And why do you automatically assume that these toilets use lots of water? Fact is, toilets using gravity for the flush tend to use far more water than pressure pump assisted electronic toilets (here in the UK 3 litres is the norm for gravity assisted flushes, while some electronic toilets use less than 0.7l) and a quick check on Google shows bidet seats that use around a litre per minute of washing. So yes, then use more than best case, but they also use less than most toilets currently in use in the west.

Beats paper, in my opinion

[Carlbunn]

Now really. trying to be serious here. While don't think an 800 dollars toilet is a necessity, we do need to get rid of the toilet paper thing. At least as the main method of cleaning. If you accidentaly got crap on your hands, would you just uh.. smudge it with some soft paper? Hell no! you would wash your hands. And still we do it all the time on our asses. That's just no good.

Go to Japan sometime

[dido]

Most everything is high-tech, including the john. That is if you've got a western-style toilet. Many of the nice places automatically turn on a seat warmer and exhaust fan as soon as you sit down, and there are a number of buttons there which spray jets of water at your anus to wash it, and some others that I'm afraid to try... However, if you have one of them Japanese-style toilets, God help you if you need to take a dump...

Re:Go to Japan sometime

[BiggerBoat]

There are those who believe there are numerous health benefits to "squat style" toilets, even to the point that you can modify your Western-style toilet to mimic one.

I'll stick to the Western-style myself, thank you.

Re:Broadband. Save the Toilets!

[RsG]

The sewage system is not a big truck! It's a series of tubes!

Oh dear...

[Anonymous Coward]

As long as our new toilets don't run Windows. I mean, isn't the bathroom the last place we have safe from Bill Gates influence?

Besides, if that happens, the obiquitous BSOD (Blue Screen of Death) may be replaced by the even worse BFOD (Brown Flood Of Death). Thanks, but I'll pass.

Electric flushes

[KNicolson]

made me realize how thankful I am that the toilet DOES NOT depend on electricity.

Being the owner of a fancy Japanese toilet in a fancy new Japanese flat, much to my dismay I have discovered that the loo doesn't actually flush in the event of a power cut! There's a remote-control flush with a back-up handle, but if you turn the power off (as my wife did shortly after we moved in, forgetting to inform me that she had or even where the ON switch was) the flush handle no longer does anything for some reason that I am yet to figure out.

However, one time when I had a case of Farmer Giles, I found the warm wash much nicer than loo paper, but the rest of the time, it never quite dries you off correctly and you're left with a disconcerting dampness for a few minutes afterwards

Re:Electric flushes

[fbjon]

I've never seen a Japanese fancy-toilet that wouldn't work in a power outage. Are you sure the water basin was filled, and the water turned on in the flat?

What, no "iLoo" reference?

[bersl2]

It's obligatory!

I'd like a toilet that...

[bitrex]

Is made entirely of clear plastic Lexan. The modern toilet is an example of perfect human engineering, I want to see the entire process from start to finish!

Oh, my Lord...it's the iLoo...

[Svartalf]

Now, while it was funny when Iliad did the initial joke in UserFriendly, it's not so funny now...

What WON'T they computerize these days?

wake up

[SinGunner]

these are standard in asia. my apartment had at least a heated toilet seat when i moved in. while it's not something super-amazing, i can come home in the dead of winter, sit down on the toilet and not feel like i'm in a goddamn igloo. the ass-cleaning thing is in the nicer models, and it's actually rather convenient. sorry if our normal american sensibilities clash with the idea of a bidet.

quit thinking your ass is so damn special. would you consider a plate clean if all you did was rub it with a piece of paper til the paper stopped changing color? what if the plate had shit on it? (and yes, you can still use the damn toilet when the power's out)

Computers in the bathroom..

[Rodness]

Why does the term "core dump" come to mind?

Sorry, couldn't resist! :)

Re:Computers in the bathroom..

[chawly]

No need to be sorry - I couldn't resist it either.

Uhhmmm...

[l0ungeb0y]

I'm sure I'm not the only one who has dubbed their laptop the "Squatbook Pro"
It's my preferred way of reading /. and as a matter of fact yes... I am on my Squatbook at this very moment.
bwahahahahahaha!

They're *years* ahead of us...

[Anonymous Coward]

"Welcome. I am honored to accept your waste."

Homer: The toilet recommended a place called Americatown.

eToilet? 7 years late .. (The Onion)

[jkrise]

http://www.theonion.com/content/node/29225/

From Palo Alto in 1999.... ""Early e-toilets forced users to keep a lot of windows open, so e-dumpers lacked the kind of privacy you want while doing your business," said designer Peter Cheng, a self-described "whiz kid"

I'd hate to cause a shot on that

[DavidV]

couldn't liquid to you cause a very easy (and painful) earth. (response to heading, ftfa)

BSOD

[8ball629]

When it clogs, do you get the BSOD?

Re:BSOD

[8ball629]

Come on... thats funny stuff.

Manufacturer Statement

[Mixel]

If ever there were a toilet that would contribute better to satisfying your bladder motives, this would be it. Don't ask why, don't ask how, it's just cool looking, and has more buttons than a stealth bomber. Complete with 8 hour emergency battery pack, heated seat and 56K modem. It's even equipped with Auto-Flush technology.

I smell a lawsuit...

New Meanings....

[Digital_Mercenary]

Microsoft OS, The new defintion of crap? "Blue screens are really messy this time."
OPEN BSD for Absolute Seat Security? "All new crypto crap."
Santa Cruz Operation Toilet Software? "The new Scots."

Runaway process - "Kernel Diahrea?"
Zombie process - "Whats that smell?"

Ok Ok It's 3am and I've been up since 6am yesterday!!!
I just figured I'd give it a shot....

--
Digital Mercenary
"Where's my money bitch!"

Data Whores Inc.
"Pimping your data All Day and All Night."

Computers are now invading the bathroom?

[sourcery]

And just what did you think a "core dump" was?

Re:Computers are now invading the bathroom?

[trash eighty]

"Computers are now invading the bathroom"

ain't that like one of the scariest things you've ever read?

Current design is NOT optimal, far from it

[Flying pig]

First, your post is extremely US-centric and betrays an ignorance of the rest of the world where the US toilet is far from a standard item. Second, it displays an ignorance of sewage processing, environmentalism and plumbing.

The present toilet uses a lot of water and is poor on hygiene. It needs a lot of water because of the things people put down it (paper being the main offender). The paper causes blockages at various points in the system and also affects the size and capability required of the sewage plant. (I have been told by a treatment expert, by the way, that modern shampoos, conditioners and shower gels also have a huge environmental burden on sewage plants.)

To put it bluntly, a system which eliminates the paper and uses a fine spray of warm water to wash your anus for you means that it is easier and cheaper to design a sewage system or to get more capacity from the old one; that maintenance is reduced; and that you no longer need to wash your hands and then wipe them on a germ-laden towel. It is also a huge benefit for elderly people who need help using the toilet (and still often end up smelling of shit)

The cretin who posted below that if you need one of these toilets it is a dietary problem, is probably unaware of the number of people who suffer from things like IBS despite eating a carefully controlled diet (maybe one in 10 of the population) or the problems of hygiene in public restrooms.

If made in volume, advanced toilets need not be very expensive. Think dishwashers and washing machines. The payback from the elimination of paper, savings on detergents, and system maintenance, could be quite short. And if you are worried about interruption of the electrical supply, just fit a UPS. Advanced aircraft and marine toilets, which use little water, work quite happily from 12 or 24V batteries.

Re:Current design is NOT optimal, far from it

[legoburner]

To be honest, a lot of what is described is available in Japan already. 17-button toilets are not too uncommon in decent hotels there, and I have seen the future and want one of their seats in my house. Such glorious electronic features include:
- Bidet with adjustable pressure, temperature, etc
- Noise maker which plays background noise so people cannot hear you making bodily noise (not so important but if you have shy relatives over and have a small house it can be beneficial)
- Automatic seat heater (although this sounds pointless if you live somewhere with harsh winters and bad heating, the cold toilet seat in the morning is pretty horrible... this is the greatest invention since sliced bread I think :), although it does feel like the toilet has just been used by a really fat person at first so takes some getting used to)
- Builtin extractor fan to remove bad smells instantly

In addition to all this, some outlandish/development level toilets are now performing analysis of your output to determine medical problems (sugar levels, etc).

Re:Current design is NOT optimal, far from it

[Anonymous Coward]

While I could see how some people would like a seat heater, there are times where I would prefer the opposite... something to cool down the seat. Nothing like sitting down to a warm sticky toilet seat (especially after someone else used it.) But at that point, condensation would become a large enough concern and a solution would need to be engineered in.

Re:Current design is NOT optimal, far from it

[drsquare]

To put it bluntly, a system which eliminates the paper and uses a fine spray of warm water to wash your anus for you means that it is easier and cheaper to design a sewage system or to get more capacity from the old one

You'll still need to use the paper to dry yourself off. And I doubt a 'fine spray' is going to do a lot when I splatter the bowl with last night's vindaloo. And I'd love to see what happens when the water's been cut off and comes back on again (when you get all the dirty water), and it sprays it all at your arse. And what about those small sloppy bits of shit that don't drop down?

and that you no longer need to wash your hands and then wipe them on a germ-laden towel.

You've invented a system for shaking off without touching your cock? You'd still need to wash your hands anyway after you wank off.

The cretin who posted below that if you need one of these toilets it is a dietary problem, is probably unaware of the number of people who suffer from things like IBS despite eating a carefully controlled diet (maybe one in 10 of the population) or the problems of hygiene in public restrooms.

Even people with explosive diahorrea don't need sophisticated cleaning systems to wipe their arses. Thick handfuls of paper is the most effective method. As for public restrooms, what condition do you think the $1000 toilets will be in? It's bad enough using the rough toilet paper, now imagine a thirty year old Electro-Bog that hasn't been maintained or cleaned, ever, firing water at you.

And if you are worried about interruption of the electrical supply, just fit a UPS.

The costs rise even further... I think with the impending energy crisis, a john that needs electricity can't be very helpful.

Re:Current design is NOT optimal, far from it

[bcattwoo]

In addition to all this, some outlandish/development level toilets are now performing analysis of your output to determine medical problems (sugar levels, etc).

<tinfoil hat>

How long before these toilets are snitching to your health/life insurance company about your eating habits???

</tinfoil hat>

The Four Seashells

[homer_ca]

100+ comments and nobody's mentioned Demolition Man and the four seashells.

Re:What about Demolition-Man reference

[Anonymous Coward]

E-toilets? He doesn't even know how to use the sea shells!

Demo man

[joystickgenie]

Man will I laugh when we start getting tech support calls because people can't figure out how to use their toilet.

"He doesn't know how to use the three seashells! (clears throught) umm I could see how that would be a problem"

Three Seashells

[homer_ca]

Oops, make that three seashells.

Draw backs...

[Timberwolf0122]

If your toilet crashes that is one log file I DONT want to rummage through!

Think simple...

[HycoWhit]

A toilet seat that projected a red X on the water at night when the seat was in the up postion and a green circle when the seat was down sure would be nice. Give me something to aim for in the middle of the night and the wife might not end of falling in those times I forget to lower the seat...

Have heard some slick things about the Japanese toilet seats. Some can cost over $5K. For the $5K you get a stool analyzer. Will detect blood in the stool and a myriad of other medical tests.

Re:Think simple...

[Yer Mom]

A toilet seat that projected a red X on the water at night when the seat was in the up postion and a green circle when the seat was down sure would be nice.

Ask, and ye shall receive...

Actually, this is removing the digits

[noidentity]

I thought it was already digital, unless you use something other than your fingers to hold the toilet paper.

Re:Broadband. Save the Toilets!

[Capt'n Hector]

As they say, it's like a series of tubes. It's not something you just dump something on.

Re:Broadband. Save the Toilets!

[fbjon]

I call for sewage neutrality!

Capitalism at its best.

[ouroseo]

It would be much better to donate that $1,000 for starving kids in Africa, than to buy your own arse-computer.

I see them all the time in Tokyo

[rhythmx]

I moved to Tokyo on business a few months ago, and (to my surprise) there were electronic controls on all the toilets in the office. Features include:

• deoderant fan
• bidet on/off
• bidet aim
• water pressure
• seat warmers

I've come to find that these are actually quite common here too.. see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toilets_in_Japan

Looks like ...

[strike_svl]

... an excellent place for a Wii!

What if it fails?

[jandersen]

Do we see 'the brown screen of death'?

- remember, the opposite of increment is excrement.

Re:Broadband. Save the Toilets!

[pimpimpim]

Yeah, but take care of the Manure Industry Association of America, who won't be pleased with you uploading all that shit for free, so they'll have problems getting their costumers to pay for their crap.

Shitting iPods

[AriaStar]

I have a friend in Ohio whose iPod took a shit earlier this year. By last count, I's sure she has taken at least that many in the last day. So yeah, does use the toilet more than her iPod. And mine has never used it. Unless it's sneaking around behind my back.

The only improvement I want to see...

[ThomsonsPier]

...is something to replace toilet paper.

We've had the human waste disposal system they way it is for many years now: isn't it about time we came up with something better than a ball of wadded paper to wipe the fecal remains from the holes in our backsides?

Water based cleansers are no good, as you'll still have to wipe to dry off. Damned if I can think of anything else, though. Any ideas?

Biosensors

[Timbotronic]

Although electronics in toilets look frivolous, I think you could combine them with biosensors in interesting ways. eg:

• Pregnancy testing
• General fertility testing to see when (or when NOT) to try for a baby
• Automated drug/alcohol testing for prison inmates
• Blood sugar testing for diabetics

Sure beats pissing in a cup

Better Idea for Computerized Toilet:

[crhylove]

How about a toilet that goes through my stool and urine and tells me what is lacking in my diet, or other easy to see health problems I may or may not have?

I don't give a shit about warm or cold seats. Pun intended.

rhY

I just woke up from a nightmare like this

[CrazyJim1]

I was running around a school with no way to get the Gospel out. So I turned to the bathroom computer. Then someone caught me, and I had to fight out. I found a colorful party of martial artists, space cowboys, and robots. We formed together into a strong fighting force of a morphing robot spaceship. We drove around fighting different installations, and finally some boss robots. After killing the boss robots, the entire corporation of lesser robots turned on us and all of humanity. These lesser robots were no easy draw. We made our way through the mall, and tried to find an escape. We came to the gaming arcade and I felt very threatened. I knew the robots knew I liked video games, and there would be legions there. So we tried to escape, but barely made our way out. I went down stairs by jumping down them, and a corporate robot was there, and I woke up. The dream was very trippy. We destroyed so many enemy robots and turrets, but in the end escape was difficult, and I woke up. Good morning Slashdot.

Whatever Next?

[mancunian_nick]

Sheesh whatever will these technos dream up next? ... Maybe a device built into this that kindly shakes 'hands' with the user after they have finished their 'business' before it gets its blow-dry ... or maybe for the home or discerning user, some kind of speed control based, perhaps, on the volume and/or tone(s) of the sittee? I suppose one way of putting is could be loo-dicrous ... but then again, if you can afford it and have money to burn, then sobeit. :D

But...

[rbarreira]

how do I use the three seashells?

Eh? Device?

[no.17]

but each of these items works fundamentally the same as they have for hundreds of years such that a person from a hundred years ago could still recognize and interface with the device.

I'm sorry, am I so out of fashion that I missed it when the humble loo became known as a 'device'?

Doesnt that bring up horrible images of extraction as opposed to deposition?

I can see the looks when I next stand up in the bar and announce I need to visit the 'device'.

Buyers of this toilet

[lovesinghal]

I could imagine that : 1. The first buyers of this toilet would be the luxury hotel chains, who usually have nothing worthwhile to advertise to their customers, and so they talk about the automatically numbered beds, or warm toilet seats. 2. The second buyers of this toilet would be the people who go to these hotels often that they are used to these toilets. And that includes the celebrities who would have just received lot of money on their albums and who dont know what to do with that money. 3. The third buyers would then be the common people who want to copy these stars and believe that they have good life. Ok, I will now go to my rightly numbered bed.

Yet another "2001:ASO" parody

[albert28]

Dave: Flush the toilet, HAL.

HAL: I'm sorry Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that.


And also a bit offtopic but still an importent reminder:
http://www.info.gov.hk/dh/diseases/ap/eng/flushtoi let.htm

Dirty Americans

[Anonymous Coward]

These are not electronic toilets. They are electronic toilet seats that you add to your toilet. They have a bidet, etc... These never went over well in America because people here are fearful of anything toilet related and are less hygenic then Asians.

Yes, you dirty Americans like having a little dried poop in your underwear and not a clean butt.

Crappy The Toilet Brush

[Gleng]

Crappy The Toilet Brush: It looks like you need to go to the toilet. Would you like to a) Urinate or b) Defecate?

John Q. Toiletuser: Just lift the damn lid, I'm busting!

Crappy: I'm sorry, I didn't understand your response. Would you like to a) Urinate or b) Defecate?

John: Oh Jesus! Err..."Defecate"

Crappy: Please answer "a" or "b". Would you like to a) Urinate or b) Defecate?

John: For fuck's sake! "B" *winces in pain from the stomach cramps* OW! HURRY!

Crappy: You chose to defecate. Thank you. Would you like me to pre-warm the seat? Yes/No?

John: I DON'T CARE! JUST LET ME SIT DOWN!

Crappy: I'm sorry, I didn't understand your response. Please answer "yes" or "no".

John: NO!

Crappy: You selected "no". The seat will not be pre-warmed. Will you require a) Durable toilet paper, or b) Extra soft toilet paper.

John: ARRGH! I don't care! It's on the move! Umm...err..."b"

Crappy: ERROR #E4F0: EXTRA SOFT PAPER NOT FOUND

John: "DURABLE" THEN!

Crappy: I'm sorry, I didn't understand your response. Please answer "a" or "b".

John: ...ack...

Crappy: I'm sorry, I didn't understand your response. Please answer "a" or "b".

John: Forget it. It's too late. "CANCEL". I'll have try my luck with the shower and the washing machine.

Crappy: I'm sorry, I didn't understand your response. Please answer "a" or "b".

Reminds me of .....

[miketheanimal]

.... a fairly revolting joke about automated toilets and removal of internal sanitary ware.

Japanese toilets

[Anonymous Coward]

You've got to love the Japanese. They have some of the world's highest-tech toilets, and they still prefer to go in the street.

Spoken like a man who don't care about his asshole

[foreverdisillusioned]

The computer part might be asinine, but built-in bidets and/or blow dryers are not. Laugh all you want, but I think it'd be rather nice to actually clean my ass instead of smearing it around, ripping out hairs when necessary (curse all you hairless fucks, curse you I say) and hopefully getting most of it. I'm not sure if computer control is strictly necessary, but it might be a welcome addition if it could e.g. control the aim and power of the water jets or even program a specific pattern to use every time.

a digital toilet?

[clickclickdrone]

>a digital toilet
Surely that's just the internet?

Sounds like...

[Anonymous Coward]

a load of shit to me.

Auto Flush

[pklong]

The only enhancement I want to toilets is an autoflush for public conviences. How many times have you entered a cubicle in a service station / mall / train station etc. and not been confronted with a jinormous log deposited by a previous tennant. Really it speaks volumes about the general public that they are too lazy / stupid to pull a lever. No wonder they struggle to turn a PC on. Even better would be a system, something like the gunge tank from Noels House Party that deposits the contents of the bowl on their head if they try to leave without doing the right thing. Is it a new sexual fetish? You get turned on by confronting other people with your jobbies?

Oh and the other thing we can do without are the daft water saving flush / cistern bags that reduce the volume of the water delivered. They don't work and you end up having to flush multiple times. I think the people who design them don't have an arsehole.

Re:Auto Flush

[ajs318]

All urinals in Britain flush automatically. Brits abroad generally don't flush after peeing because they don't expect to have to. I have also seen non-contact WC flushing controls in some UK public facilities: this consists of a motion sensor in front of which you wave your hand, and which operates a solenoid which pulls up the flush mechanism. {This is using the rest-of-world flush mechanism, only recently legalised in the UK, where a round-bottomed stopper is displaced from a hole in the base of the cistern and floats on the discharging water until the cistern is empty. Older UK installations used a syphon to discharge the cistern and had the advantage that holding down the flush lever would not cause continuous emptying: the syphon could only be started with the cistern full.}

As for water-saving WC cisterns, I recently had a new WC installed with a close-coupled, 6 litre cistern and I find that even on half flush it will usually dispose of "big business". The WC basin and flushing cistern are designed together as a system: it would be foolish to expect a 6L cistern to properly flush a WC designed for a 9L flush. In general, a washdown WC {where the waste is simply pushed out of the basin by the flushwater: common in UK and Europe} will use less water, and be less prone to blockage, than a syphonic-action WC {where a partial vacuum is created in the trap and the waste is drawn out of the basin: common in USA, not to be confused with the UK system of using a syphon to empty the cistern into a [usually] washdown basin}.

Toilet paper is an invention of Beelzebub...

[ofcourseyouare]

Bless them, father, for they know not what they are talking about: God designed bottoms to be cleaned with water; toilet paper is an invention of Beelzebub.

I lived in Indonesia for a few years, and came to realise that the natural, healthy, comfortable way to clean one's bum is with water. In Indonesia, you have these wonderful hosepipe things which you use to squirt yourself with. Japanese smart toilets (and the ones in TFA) are a way to bring this delightful way of doing things to an urban enivronment where (unlike Indonesia) you can't rely on tropical heat to dry your bottom.

Water cleaining is much cleaner and more comfortable than paper, and think of the environmental benefits -- the entire toilet paper industry could cease to exist! I propose we start a green movement of proud water-jet-toilet-users, who could go around wearing t-shirts proclaiming I DON'T USE TOILET PAPER.

Of course it might be misunderstood...

don't sit there too long

[ebief]

Any proctologist can tell you that spending too much time on the toiletseat will cause hemorroids.
 
When pressing and pushing to get things out, blood collects in the veins back there and causes hemorroids.
People who are used to reading the newspaper while on the toilet tend to get hemoroids more often than those who don't...

I think..

[BlindFate]

Their business model is wrong.. 1. Build Robot Toilet 2. PROFIT Something tells me that very few people will. Oh and, I usually use my iPod more than the toilet. Somedays I use it longer than I sleep

The next wave

[RealErmine]

there are some things whose design has absolutely been optimized to a point where it would take a revolution in technology to make any changes worth while

What? You don't know how to use the three seashells?

Really?

[Anonymous Coward]

a toilet is the classic example of something that is mission critical ... It has to work under all sorts of conditions

I guess you've never gone backpacking in the wilderness? Toilets are not essential, they're just "nice to have".

Re:Really?

[thePowerOfGrayskull]

I guess you've never gone backpacking in the wilderness? Toilets are not essential, they're just "nice to have".

If I shit in my backyard, my neighbors would call the cops. And if I shit in on my floor, my wife would kill me.

I'd say that qualifies as "mission critical".

Re:Really?

[QMO]

Probably the poster of the grandparent lives in some kind of city or town, where there are several thousand (million) people. In such a situation, some kind of toilet (not necessarily flush) is critical to prevent the spread of disease.

Soldiers don't haven't been digging latrines for centuries just to keep busy. It helps the army win wars when fewer of them have a digestive tract infection.

forget the seat warmer - how about medical...

[clickety6]

forget the seat warmer - how about building medical diagnostics into the toilet? Maybe a smaller, water free area you can pee into and then it can tell you if your pee is within an acceptable colour range (too dark - drink more water?) or perhaps even perform a simple urine sugar level test or proteins test. When you flush, this "cup" would then get washed out. You could even build in a pregnancy testing unit- save trying to pee on a stick :-)

Prhaps do the saem with fecal matter? Old european toilets had a inspection shelf for checking for worms or other probelms. We could do this with image recognition instead - and fecal colour can tell a lot about a person's health too...

control panel icons

[chooki]

Have you seen the electronic controls for a bidet? They generally have the most beautiful icon in existence for the "wash" function. Generally some variant of universally-represent-water-splashing-a$$ line drawing.

Saw it when I was wandering around Lowe's one day. I lost it for about 10 minutes when I saw the button..

I have a well in my backyard

[way2trivial]

powered by an electric pum.

power outages do not kill the ability to flush the toilet.

more than 1-15 times, yeah....

Didn't Tim Taylor actually do this?

[Espectr0]

He called it the "Lazy-Bowl". Featured a reclining seat and armrests.

It was the episode called "the man's restroom" or something.

Toilet Clippy

[SpinyNorman]

It looks like you're taking a dump! Would your like some toilet paper for that?

Hmm - excuse me..

[Anonymous Coward]

.. is that Dell technical support?

yes?

My computer won't boot and I need you to fix it...

What's wrong?

Well, I had this wicked case of diarrhoea.....

It's not trucks!

[Anonymous Coward]

...It's a series of TUBES!

Dude -

[Any Web Loco]

You spend WAY too much time in the can!

What's wrong with you people?

[NoMaster]

252 comments - and nobody has mentioned the iPood?

Ultimate iPod accessory

[Supercrunch]

"Most people use toilets more often than iPods..." Which reminds me of this (apparently real) item: http://www.atechflash.com/products-icarta.html

Electricity....

[Slovenian6474]

...There's something about putting electricity into something that holds water, and then you sit on. When the product does not NEED to be electric.

Useless

[JockTroll]

Who needs toilets when there's plenty of nerds' faces to shit on?

Seriously, there's nothing like shitting on a geek's face. You've got to beat them out some before, but that's what they're for.

Continuing offtopic

[QMO]

In Chile (Spanish-speaking) there's a similar saying that can translate to "in the house of the blacksmith, knife like a stick"

This explains a lot when you realize that my father is a psychologist.

Oops, Another Dooplikate

[artson]

For an in-depth discussion of the ramifications, imperfections and significance of the electronic toilet, see the recent Slashdot discussion here.

Washing wiping. Anyday. In Asia.

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

Our verdict? While some features of the Swash 800 made our sit-down experience more of a luxury, we were unconvinced by its bidet-like cleaning and drying process.

Most Asians consider wiping with paper not hygenic enough. Must wash with liberal quantities of water to be clean and to feel clean. In India and Middle East the recent toilets have a simple non-digital non-electronic bidet like attachment. It dispenses a horizontal stream of water from behind. In India it is quite common to see a hand shower attachement next to the flush tank.

Only left hand should be used for washing. So the left hand is considered to be unclean and it is considered very disrespectful to give/accept something from someone using the left hand, in the Middle East and India.

Years ago...

[segfault7375]

They had this years ago!

Re:Asinine , and worse

[Ancient_Hacker]

Problem is, there are some gadgets that people insist must work every time, and the current versions ARE very cheap, simple, and reliable. Things like: light switches, automobile brakes, and toilets.

Which explains why fancy light switches, computerized brakes, and I daresay, computerized toilets, tend to be rejected by the populance. The first time a smart light-switch does something unexpected, or a toilet doesnt flush, people tend to get irate, or worse.

Do these electronic toilets come with built-in UPS

[Name Anonymous]

Power outages do happen. What happens when there's an extended power outage and all the toilets in a house require electricity to operate?

Do pepole have to hold it in? FInd a neighbor with an old fashioned toilet? Or do they use their toilet and hope power returns before the toilets overflow?

Re:Washing wiping. Anyday. In Asia.

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

To clarify the subject line: I had a greater than sign in the subject line between washing and wiping. The html tags checker ate it.

Bottom line (a-heh!)

[Anonymous Coward]

Look, this is the choice. You either stick your finger up your ass, protected by toilet paper, smear shit on the paper, hoping to get it all, not to mention the friction trauma to your delicate rectal membranes... or you wash with water and dry with air.

Your choice.

Black Box

[Anonymous Coward]

If toilets go electronic then I wonder how long before manufacturers start putting black boxes into toilets to track what goes through. It's the only thing they haven't bugged yet in the name of fighting terrorism. If your turds have nothing to hide then why should you worry, right?

Re:Washing wiping. Anyday. In Asia.

[Reapman]

Going to Japan I was impresed with their toilets (speaking of the "North American style", never actually used a hole in the floor one), and some of them were quite... impressive. The control panel on the side controlled lots of features, some I could figure out, some I did'nt even try touching. If there was no electricity (as was pointed out above) it just worked like a normal toilet, I know this since I accidently turned one off once. Being able to wash is really a great idea, I can see why they'd consider that more hygenic. And who can argue with a seat warmer? Like a lot of things we've really fallen behind back here, no pun intended. If I buy a house I'll probably splurge on the throne.

Coolest toilet I saw in Japan...

[Valdrax]

I never saw any of the crazy, high-tech toilets when I was there in 2000, but my host family had what I thought was the simplest and greatest idea that every toilet should have. When the toilet needed to refill the top tank after a flush, it did so through a spigot that poured the water over the top of the toilet into a lid-sink for washing your hands. There was no reason to separately turn on the sink to wash your hands when the was water that was going to go to waste being poured into a tank right in front of you.

Simple, low-tech, water-saving, and it gives a strong reminder to wash hands immediately after flushing. I cannot see why all toilets don't have that simple change. It's brilliant.

Alert the OED

[kaaona]

This adds a whole new definition and context for the term "core dump".

Obligatory joke

[TheUnknownCoder]

On a flight to Singapore, a gentleman had made several attempts to get into the men's restroom, but it had always been occupied. The flight attendant noticed his predicament. Sir, she said "You may use the ladies room if you promise not to touch any of the buttons on the wall." He did what he needed to, and as he sat there he noticed the buttons he had promised not to touch. Each button was identified by letters: WW, WA, PP, and a red one labeled ATR. Who would know if he touched them? He couldn't resist. He pushed WW. Warm water was sprayed gently upon his bottom. What a nice feeling, he thought. Men's restrooms don't have nice things like this. Anticipating greater pleasure, he pushed the WA button. Warm air replaced the warm water, gently drying his underside. When this stopped, he pushed the PP button. A large powder puff caressed his bottom adding a fragile scent of spring flowers to this unbelievable pleasure. The ladies restroom was more than a restroom, it is tender loving pleasure. When the powder puff completed its pleasure, he couldn't wait to push the ATR button which he knew would be supreme ecstasy. Next thing he knew he was in a hospital as he opened his eyes. A nurse was staring down at him with a smile on her face. "What happened?" he exclaimed. "You pushed one too many buttons," replied the nurse. "The last button marked ATR was an Automatic Tampon Remover. Your balls are in the bucket under the bed"

And then...

[Anonymous Coward]

... Do we have to wipe our arses with e-paper?

Round plungers in square drain holes

[raygunz]

What drives me crazy is that all new toilets have fancy, artistically-shaped drain holes but all plungers are round. High-tech plungers with accordian-fold power reservoirs, etc, but they all have round seals that don't fit the square holes and all that power leaks around the corners. You get shitty water squirting up around the bowl and no pressure on the plugged pipes. Damn, I wish the plunger people would get with it, or the toilet people would go back to round holes. "American Standard" seems so ironic at times like that...

What's the big deal?

[SFSouthpaw]

In the end, it's the same old shit.

Toilet OS

[ickies]

But does it run Linux?

I wonder if it has

[JustNiz]

pee-er to pee-er networking?

Lazy

[adbloggers]

Are people really getting this lazy?

Mobileshout

Flush-sound button

[DeadCatX2]

The flush sound button exists because some people were embarassed to take a voracious dump while in the presence of others, and were flushing excessively to cover up the sound. So the designers added a flush-sound button that they can press repeatedly without wasting water.

I can't remember where I read it, or I would give a citation.

The toilet's got bigger problems

[poopreport]

I am the editor of PoopReport.com, a site dedicated to the intellectual appreciation of poop humor. I'm also the author of a book about the impact of poop on contemporary culture, to be published this spring. I've done a lot of research on the toilet and its role in our society, so I speak with some authority when I say this: the toilet is deeply flawed. The cosmetic improvements as described in the article are nice, but we have bigger issues to worry about.

First: the toilet has saved millions of people from disease. I recognize that it's one of the great inventions of our day. But when you examine the externalities it's created, you realize that there's a lot of work on it that needs to be done -- and I'm not talking about heated seats and water sprayers.

1.4 gallons per flush = 32 billion gallons of water per day wasted in the US, according to my research. That water flows to 600,000 miles of sewer pipes to 16,000 sewage treatment plants, each costing many millions (an in some cases, billions) of dollars. There they attempt to sequester the solids and cleanse the water. They've gotten pretty good at making the water safe; but the problem is with the solids. The leftover sludge isn't just organic matter -- it's contaminated with household chemicals and industrial pollutants both illegally and legally dumped into the sewers. In many places, this sludge is (after bacterial digestion) applied to farmland as fertilizer.

If it were just organic matter, everyone would be happy. But this application to the land concentrates the contaminants and assures that they will one day return to haunt us, either by moving up into the plants that grow in the soil or down into the water cycle. It's true that there are techniques to maintain a certain pH balance in the soil so that the contaminants remain suspended, but for that to be safe then every farmer will have to apply lime or other chemicals to every acre of land that's been treated with sludge for the rest of time. Unlikely.

We need to recognize the externalities caused by our current waste management infrastructure, and work to eliminate them (without losing any of the sanitary benefits the flush toilet has indubitably brought us). A water sprayer is nice, and I can't argue against heated seats, but that's just cosmetic -- we have a lot more serious issues to worry about.

Oh Dear... where to start with the jokes?

[Anonymous Coward]

1. Blue Screen of Death anyone?
2. And all this time you thought there was more to Captain Kirk's chair than met the eye.
3. Log files have just sunk to an all new low. So has scanning log files.
4. Hacking personal home appliances have never been more fun. Web cam versions even better.
5. Does insurance cover a burnt ass ring?
6. What about the mixing of urine and exposed wiring?
7. Can I get one with the James Bond ejection seat option? With internet access and GPS recording?
8. Killer microbes on your heated toilet seat! (breathless pause) Film at 11!
9. Will these come with a surge protector option? Which surge protection you ask?
10. Plumber: "No ma'am. None of our technicians are available. Would you stand (er, sit) by for 20 minutes for the next available technician?"
11. "Pop me down jack me up shoot me out headin down the highway" ruins an old Eddie Rabbit tune.
12. American Standard sued by relatives of an electrocution victim on their toilet. Hundreds recalled.
13. Tim "the toolman" Taylor: Home Depot toilet seats? Mine will have neon lights, programmable patterns, book light option, UPS battery backup, 5 speed blending options with variable transmission, powered by a 350 small block engine with multi-port fuel injection. Argh, argh, argh.... ARGH!!!!! Gotta put a heat shield on that exhaust manifold! And Al "the logman" Borland will test it. I see you're wearing your plaid lumberjack shirt. But what's with the goggles and life preserver?
14. I see a new round of YouTube videos involving "spontaneously igniting flatulence", with lightly toasted undersides and burnt butt hair.
15. With negative pressure to suck away the smell, will we see a new generation of "I'm sitting...and I can't get up!" commercials aimed at senior citizen personal alert devices?
16. Give me an echo cancelling device to allow for clear cell phone calls on the can, and I'm golden!

17. Will installation manuals come with clear instructions to avoid crossed wires?
18. Oh crap... I'm late for work.

Oops, didn't mean to put an 18. there... wait, an alarm clock!

Just be very careful if you are a guy

[spun]

When using high tech Japanese toilets, do NOT accidentally push the "automatic tampon removal" button.

Electricity near the toilet seat common?

[azdio]

I do not often find electricity near toilet seats in the US. Are there maybe building codes against this? Perhaps contractors are not accoustomed to this need. This has been the only obstacle I have found to this upgrade.

the japanese are years ahead in toilet tech

[Anonymous Coward]

i got back from a vacation to japan, and their toilets are truly badass. at the very least, every toilet has two flushes - literally labeled 'big' and 'small'. now, isn't that a clever way to save some water? no need for a big flush if you just took a whiz, no? the fancier stuff i couldn't figure out (what with it being in japanese and all), but various bidet & toilet seat temperature options were fairly common. that stuff may be rather superfluous, but i think water-efficiency is one area where tech toilets could be quite useful.

one other clever toilet design: putting a sort of semi-sink above the tank. the water that refills the tank after you flush comes out a spigot, so you can wash your hands as it fills. that water is only getting crapped in, so who cares if it's not quite new? not high-tech, but smart and efficient engineering.

I just want a toilet built on my scale

[drinkypoo]

...or basically anything else. I'm over 2 meters tall and nothing is made to fit me. There is no car or truck that is built on my scale; even the ones big enough to move houses around have seats and controls designed for "normal" people. And there are few examples better than the toilet. I've used some porcelain thrones that were adequate but the simple fact is that a toilet acceptable for a five year old is not going to be reasonable for someone who's as tall as I am, and (sadly) over twenty stone. Now, I can do something about the width of my ass, but not the length. Why the fuck is there no such thing as a toilet sized for the modern man? People are only getting taller over time, as nutrition and health improve in step.

so when you hear

[rice_burners_suck]

So when you're a parent, and you hear your kid saying "oh oh" from the bathroom, that means, what, that Windows crashed and therefore there is now a turd floating down the hall? Talk about a buffer overflow.

Will usage be recorded in...

[chiller2]

... log files?

Ok, I'll get my coat.

Ah, I see...

[John Pfeiffer]

...so we're buying Japanese toilets now, are we?

ipoop

[zamole]

Hassled for using "pod"?

You know it's a slow news day at Slashdot when...

[Anonymous Coward]

You know it's a slow news day at Slashdot when they're posting submissions from my hometown newspaper. I live in Niceville, Fl http://maps.google.com/maps?oi=map&q=Niceville,+FL . Yes, the people are nice here, but our paper sucks.

These are common in Japan

[ChrisA90278]

Have you ever been to Japan? I was there recently visting my in-laws. They bought a new condo and as you might guess after some time I had need to check out the bathroom. So I'm siting there and notice this control console with an LCD display and a bunch of buttons and it's all in Japaneese and I can't read a word of it. I'm afraid to push anyhting. Fortunatly there was still the standerd chrome lever handle. Later I had my wife translate. You can adjust the seat temperture, water sprays and air blowers and 4 other parameters. It seems the condo builders put these in every unit along with the microwave, dishwasher, laundry machine, stove and so on. Even teh airconditioner has a large complex programmagle control. But it is all well designed, you can ignore the part you don't understand so even I can use everything in a miniman way They've come a long way from the traditional house with rice paper divider walls that my wive grew up in. They did not even own a cloths washer in those days, they were not affordable, "gramma" used a washboard and tub in the early 60's but now the computer controlled comode just comes with the house, like it or not.

Yes, but...

[Locke2005]

Does it run Linux? 'Cause when my ass is on the line (literally), It had darn well better not be running Windows! Sort of gives a whole new meaning to the phrase "core dump", doesn't it?

Down with skid marks ...

[yusing]

Up with warm air!

I have absolutely nothing to add...

[MrPoopyPants]

... but I think my username is so appropriate for this story that I must post something.

I would prefer sort of a "multiple chamber" design rather than the current "try to use water--sometimes with vacuum assistance--to squeeze all of the contents through a narrow, winding pipe". Why not a physical mechanism to close off the sewer AND allow a more streamlined evacuation of the bowl?

That is all.

Better have a backup, or a bucket

[Anonymous Coward]

Last weekend I saw an electric toilet on This Old House. I laughed my ass off, they FAILED to mention what you do when you have a power failure! As a person whose lived in a house without electricity for two weeks, due to an ice storm, I know what it's like to do so. I kept changing the oxygen tank for a neighbor as her breathing machine was out (she was 100), so what do we do, set up a bicycle to generate enough spark to flush?

Oh yes, it shall be called "i-Shit"

[i41Overlord]

The "i-Shit" will become a global phenomenon.

currents can travel upstream

[Anonymous Coward]

A computerized toilet - perhaps now if some guy pees on the seat he will get zapped with an electric shock, which might make a lot of girlfriends and wives very satisfied.

$1000 Toilet Seats

[funpet]

$1000 toilet seats? The white house has had those for years.

You can get one for $200 in Japan

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, there are $3000 toilets and $1500 seats in Japan, but the low-end ones--with fewer settings and fancy controls but that do the same basic thing--are available in discount home centers for as low as US$200. For $300-400 you can get a fairly nice one with temperature and pressure controls for the spray and two different spray patterns, as well as a heated seat and a soft-closer for the lid. There are online places that sell Japanese goods in the US--that's what Google is for. You can probably find one that way for not too much of a premium, or you can try to find a Japanese-speaking friend who can arrange to have a Japanese on-line retailer ship one to you. Heck, try eBay first--I found a dozen or so at reasonable prices by searching for "washlet."

You guys are all way behind

[somekool]

Japan and Europe had those for years and years. wake up, United-States is not the center of the universe. Hell, you have'nt even found a real planet.

I've got one of these...

[sofakingon]

I am an American living in Seoul. As a wedding gift, some of my wife's friends pooled their money and got us an electronic bidet. They definately do a better job at cleaning your rear than toilet paper. I'm taking it with me when I go back to the states, for sure.