Weekend Edition recently asked me (on the fly) to figure out a way to get people to speak more quietly when speaking on cellphones in trains or restaurants.
My first idea was to engineer a phone so that the message could not go through if you spoke too loudly.
A train could only allow you to use certified phones. Or might alternatively use a bluetooth technology (an existing short range wi fi system) that automatically switches phone to train/restaurant mode when you enter the area.
But Yale Law School Professor Rick Brooks independently suggested an even better feedback mechanism that might educate or "train" riders to speak softer. You could engineer the phone to ampliphy in the caller's ear her own voice so that she would think she was speaking even louder than she really was.
Rick's idea makes me think too that the train might have an automatic sensor that notifies the passenger when someone is speaking too loudly near her seat.
Peter Siegelman tells me his son's kindergarden already has this system -- a green-yellow-red light system that tells the class as it starts to get too noisy.
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You're working too hard to fix a problem the market is already fixing. Many trains are offering "cell-free" cars, and I am sure some enterprising restaurant owners are offering cell/non-cell sections, or entirely cell free restaurants.
If the sonic quality of cell phones was improved there would be less loud talking.
People seem willing to wear odd contraptions while using a cell phone (don't tell me those headsets aren't goofy)...
so why not something worn like on the throat or near the vocal chords (I am not a biologist or an engineer, so feel free to correct the idea to actally work) so that a person could whisper (or talk very quietly) and the microphone would pick up the speech.
Certainly a society of people walking around whispering to themselves would look silly, but a whole lot better than the annoying loud cell phone conversations we are subjected to these days (try walking around a college campus, it's not even like anyone is talking about something important!)
I love the idea of amplifying the person to make it louder in their own ear piece to quiet them down.
The first post on here talks about cell phone free zones? Are you referring to a voluntary system?
There are cell phone blocking devices that are used in Mosques in the Middle East, but these are illegal in the US due to FCC restriction. I would like to see them used in the US at movie theatres, yoga studios, lecture halls etc. I guess that would be another 'Why Not' thread...
I believe that people are not annoyed by people making short and really important calls, but hate long, useless calls. So all we need to do is get people to think about whether they need to make the call in the first place. Traditionally we do this through taxation. 10p on fags, 5p on a pint, and 2p on a cell-phone minute!
I like this idea, and I have voted for it, more in princible than in implementation. Many cellphones deliberately cut off or attenuate the volume in the earpiece of the user so as to reduce feedback. The amount of audible information about my own voice is far less on my cellphone than it is on my home phone. If this could be done without causing complications, I think it's the best solution. Cellphone shouters are so annoying.
Few comments:
1. I your phone volume is always high – you won’t like it, and prefer a different brand – for this reason I don’t expect manufacturers to implement it as suggested.
2. I’d like to suggest a very different approach. Put signs saying “Speaking laud for long time might heart your voice (as well as disturbing other people)” – This need to be tested to see if it is effective – I expect it to drill down to the minds of the people.3. If you’re able to EASILY adjust the hearing volume in your cell phone, you’ll fill confident that to other party of the call hear you good as well – this in addition to point #2 could reduce the problem.
http://www.whynot.net/view_idea.php?id=1782 <<Read my idea at the end and let me know if you think it would work.
Here in Helsinki, the home of Nokia where every man, woman and child carries a cell phone, everybody speaks softly into their phone and nobody is annoyed. Must be something cultural.