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Inventor of the TV Remote Control Dies

Posted by Soulskill on from the rest-in-peace dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Yes, kids, you used to have to walk across the room to change the TV channel. That changed with the introduction of the 'Flash-Matic,' a revolutionary device that was 'Absolutely harmless to humans!' and could 'even shut off annoying commercials while the picture remains on the screen.' Eugene Polley, inventor of the now ubiquitous TV remote-control died Sunday of natural causes at age 96. In 1996 Polley received an Emmy for his invention, but during his 47-year career, he was awarded numerous patents and worked on projects ranging from advances in radar to push-button car radios."

27 of 113 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Duplicate idea by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Not sure if dumb or troll...

  2. Do you think they've tried turning his batteries by duguk · · Score: 5, Funny

    Do you think they've tried turning his batteries round and smacking him against the coffee table?

  3. Re:Duplicate idea by Chemisor · · Score: 5, Informative

    > this device was quite much copied from Nokia's symbian phones

    Even though we have remote controls today, and clicking on the article link no longer requires you to get your ass out of your chair, you can still make a fool of yourself by being too lazy to read it and discover that the first remote control was invented in 1955, long before there was Symbian, or mobile phones.

  4. Re:Duplicate idea by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I think the '1996' in the article threw him off; actually this should be about the inventor of the wireless remote control, it's from 1955 (the one with the wire was from 1950 and was called the Zenith 'Lazy Bones')

  5. in honor of Eugene Polley by FudRucker · · Score: 3

    I will get up and change the channel the old fashioned way for the rest of the day, when i was a kid there were no remote controls, my father's TV had two big giant channel knobs on it, the first one was VHF 2 thru 13 and a "U" between the 2 and the 13 and to get UHF you put the first knob on the "U" and then it activated the second channel knob for UHF channels

    --
    Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
    1. Re:in honor of Eugene Polley by dccase · · Score: 4, Funny

      I want a button for GET OFF MY LAWN!!

    2. Re:in honor of Eugene Polley by patchmaster · · Score: 2

      I will get up and change the channel the old fashioned way for the rest of the day,

      I would do that, but my TV doesn't have a channel changer on it. It's remote or nothing.

  6. If it was invented tomorrow... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    ... I wonder what the MPAA / RIAA / The Bad Guys would say about muting their precious commercials?

    I'm sure a "do not mute" flag would quickly appear in the DVB stream.

    1. Re:If it was invented tomorrow... by EdIII · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Dude.... STFU... you could give them ideas today.

  7. Parrot TV by JoeMerchant · · Score: 4, Interesting

    In the 1970s some remote controls used ultrasonics - ultra to humans, not to parrots... not sure if the bird was changing the channels on purpose or not, but it would make a whistle and the channel would change.

    1. Re:Parrot TV by rekoil · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I remember these. They weren't even electronic - each button on the remote caused a tine to be pulled and released which was tuned to a specific ultrasonic frequency. This is why the early remotes were called "clickers" - releasing the tine made a metallic clicking sound. It also meant that random ambient sounds that matched the target frequency could cause your TV to turn on/off, change channels, etc on its own.

      There were also remotes that weren't even wireless, with a 10' long tether wire to the unit. The advertised "advantage" of these was that they didn't need batteries.

    2. Re:Parrot TV by million_monkeys · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I remember these. They weren't even electronic - each button on the remote caused a tine to be pulled and released which was tuned to a specific ultrasonic frequency. This is why the early remotes were called "clickers" - releasing the tine made a metallic clicking sound. It also meant that random ambient sounds that matched the target frequency could cause your TV to turn on/off, change channels, etc on its own.

      There were also remotes that weren't even wireless, with a 10' long tether wire to the unit. The advertised "advantage" of these was that they didn't need batteries.

      They should have advertised the advantage as "never lose your remote again".

    3. Re:Parrot TV by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      " They weren't even electronic - each button on the remote caused a tine to be pulled and released which was tuned to a specific ultrasonic frequency."

          They were also introduced by Zenith a year later, and called "The Space Command". They were far more successful than the "Flash-Matic", which had to be aimed accurately, went through batteries quickly, and the TV had to be kept out of direct lighting or the photocells on the TV wouldn't trigger, or would be triggered randomly.

          We had our 25" monochrome Zenith until 1976, when my parents decided to _finally_ get a colour set. (I think that a lot of that had to do with fact that I was just learning to drive, and I found out that a combination of car keys and small coins gently jiggled in my pocket would cause the TV to go nuts.)

    4. Re:Parrot TV by jimicus · · Score: 3, Funny

      I've already got a remote control of sorts that does that - it's called "big box of dry cat food".

  8. "Currently Dead"? Check! by balzi · · Score: 5, Funny

    I can't believe this guy. He is so committed to getting in the current slashdot poll, that he's become the newest "Currently Dead Inventor".

    I will create a post in the poll comments to record his memory forever - the inventor is dead! Long live the Inventor!

    --
    "I split coffee all over my wife's nightie .... serves me right for wearing it" -Speelberg, no 'Spar
  9. Re:Do you think they've tried turning his batterie by Bigby · · Score: 5, Funny

    To honor him, every channel should show him at the same time for 5 minutes straight. People will start using their remotes to change the channel, only to get nowhere. Only then will they truly understand the importance of the remote control.

  10. I never saw one of those by John+Jorsett · · Score: 4, Interesting

    My folks were in the TV sales business and I never encountered a remote like the article describes. The first remotes I saw in the 50s were wired: a big box with the channel and volume controls was connected by a thick cable to the TV. The channel tuning was mechanical (a cylinder in the set had a separate tuned circuit for each channel and channel changing required rotating the cylinder to switch in the correct one), so when you changed the channel, the tuner in the set would go *clunk* clunk* *clunk* until it got to the right one. The next ones I remember were Zenith wireless. The remote consisted of several metal cylinders that emitted a tone when struck by a mechanical pushbutton on the remote. Trouble with those was other household sounds would trigger the TV, like the metal tags on a pet's collar.

    And I'll bet almost no one here has ever encountered a vertical or horizontal "hold" control. In those days, we had to establish picture sync ourselves, AND WE LIKED IT!

    1. Re:I never saw one of those by ACS+Solver · · Score: 4, Funny

      I think I just realized one of the few advantages of coming from a Soviet country - I was surprised by a remote control as a luxurious item in around 1995 ;)

    2. Re:I never saw one of those by R3d+M3rcury · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Years ago, I read a great article by Bruce "Tog" Tognazzini about Transactional Analysis and how it relates to UIs and such. I don't remember if it's in any of his books or in the Apple Developer newsletters of yore. I'm having a hard time finding it, unfortunately. But in the article, he recounts a story about selling televisions with digital remotes--back when these were brand new.

      The story goes that when TVs first got digital remote controls, the salesmen would show the customer the remote because, at the time, the ability to change the channel from across the room was new and novel and pretty cool! But the customer would always say the same thing: "I'm not so lazy that I can't get off the damn couch and change the channel!" And, let's be honest, how would you respond to that? "Actually, sir, you are that lazy. Or you will be once you have this." Keep in mind that the only time you saw a TV with a remote was in a hospital or if you had older parents/grandparents who couldn't get off the damn couch and change the channel. If you were young and spry, you had no business using a remote! Having a remote was a sign that you were old...

      Once they said that, they weren't interested in TVs with remotes and no amount of salesmanship would change their mind.

      So the solution that Tog brought up wasn't to sell the customer on having a remote control, but to sell them on digital tuning. "Digital tuning is great! No more having to fiddle with all the fine tuning knobs to get the best picture! Just choose the channel and it will immediately lock it in! No knobs to break or get serviced--after all, you should have your TV serviced every year so that you don't end up having to use a pair of pliers to change the channel. So you'll save money in the long run because there'll be less need for service! Digital tuning is a boon to mankind!"

      Once you've convinced the TV buyer that they really want a TV with digital tuning, you throw in the remote: "And the fun part is that they can then make a cool remote control to change the channels!" The idea was that you're buying a better TV that happened to have a remote (which was a smart decision) rather than buying a remote controlled TV (which was a lazy decision). In fact, so the story goes, one day the salesman neglected to even mention the remote. The customer bought the TV and salesman brought out a bunch of boxes, one of which contained the remote. When the customer said, "What's that?" and the salesman said, "Oh, that's the remote," the customer immediately started off with, "I'm not so lazy that I..."

      The whole thing is presented in the frame of Transactional Analysis and the Parent/Adult/Child context (ie, you want to have an appropriate balance of smart and cool in your products) and is a very interesting read.

    3. Re:I never saw one of those by Brett+Buck · · Score: 2

      There were radios with wireless remotes in the 30's. The Philco "Mystery Control" used radio control to run the radio using something very much like a telephone dial.

      http://www.philcorepairbench.com/mystery/index.htm

            Brett

    4. Re:I never saw one of those by stepho-wrs · · Score: 2

      The day that I get so lazy that I can't order one of the kids to get up and change the channel ...

    5. Re:I never saw one of those by usuallylost · · Score: 2

      The story goes that when TVs first got digital remote controls, the salesmen would show the customer the remote because, at the time, the ability to change the channel from across the room was new and novel and pretty cool! But the customer would always say the same thing: "I'm not so lazy that I can't get off the damn couch and change the channel!"

      They didn't need a fancy remote not because they were not lazy but because they had kids for those jobs. I can clearly remember my father, in particular, yelling for my siblings and I to come change the channel and do any additional tuning necessary. So not only did he already have a remote it was one that would fetch iced tea, sandwiches and mow the lawn.

  11. Arrangements for the funeral... by Lord_of_the_nerf · · Score: 4, Funny

    He will be respectfully tucked in between the cushions of a couch.

  12. Re:Duplicate idea by ortholattice · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Actually, the first remote control was invented by Tesla in 1898 (U.S. Patent 613,809). He used it to remotely flash lights on a boat, amazing an audience. Eugene Polley specialized it to "for a TV". Sort of like many modern inventions consist of an earlier idea + "on the internet". (OK maybe not that simple but I thought I'd toss it in for a good troll...)

  13. Ultrasonic remotes by MrEricSir · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I believe I've mentioned this on here before, but my grandfather had one of the early TVs with an ultrasonic remote up until the 90's.

    The problem is certain sounds would cause it to change the channel -- particularly jingling keys or coins, flushing the toilet, or using a vacuum cleaner.

    I suspect he enjoyed demoing that for people more than he liked watching TV.

    --
    There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
  14. Re:Do you think they've tried turning his batterie by mykepredko · · Score: 5, Funny

    Tabatha Southey (Toronto Globe and Mail Columnist) suggests that it would be most appropriate for Mr. Polley to be buried under some couch cushions.

    RIP and thank you for relieving the few calories of energy it took to get our fat asses up and over to the TV to change the channel.

    myke

    --
    Mimetics Inc. Twitter
  15. Re:Duplicate idea by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    And it's always worth pointing out that Tesla was the greatest geek that ever lived.