This is a fun app.
One way I deal with people talking on speakerphone, is inviting myself into their conversation and making comments as if I were an active participant. That usually earns me a weird look, and then they go off speaker so I can't hear what's been said. Success.
Similar with folks watching reels on speaker, I fake a laugh or make comments about the content. It's awkward enough that they usually stop because they want a moment alone, not an interactive session with a stranger. Which ironically is the same thing I want too.
A friend of mine works AV at shows that have rotating DJs and one of the things she has on her mixer board is "The Suck Button."
It causes a mic at the other end of the room to get cut into the DJ's live feed monitor with a semitone shift down and some reverb. This causes all sorts of inner-ear chaos and usually clears a DJ off the stage when they're over time within a few minutes at most -- usually under 30 seconds. One time they were trying to figure out why it wasn't working and discovered that the DJ had muted their monitor feed, which explained why they were not only peaking the meters but over time: They hadn't heard the FOUR warnings from the back of house that it was time to wrap up.
There was a coffee shop ages ago in SF that would every few hours play a cacophony (e.g. multiple songs at once). I assume it was to drive away people camping on their laptops to rotate tables. Understand but super annoying to people like me who had a timer to but food or drink no less than hourly to be a good citizen
It's maybe best not to give too much context to this, except just to warn you to turn down the volume and not watch if you might suffer from epilepsy.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UJT8vfraCmk
When this was first presented, I was watching this in a large dark hall with this on the projector and the sound level set to extremely loud. Like a fool, I sat through this to the end wondering whether it was going to ever end rather than recognising it as a glorious troll.
That's extremely annoying. I have a Bluetooth speaker that I was intending to repurpose into a device to combat inconsiderate smart phone usage. I connected it to my laptop and started playing multiple streams of Punjabi MC - Beware of the Boys. It was torturous.
My other idea was to get the line from dumb and dumber "Do you want to hear the most annoying sound in the world..." And just loop the sound continuously.
I might just try this project though and see how it goes.
We had a friend who would play Metal when the ice cream store he worked at was closed but the customers were lingering too long. It generally worked, as he was immune.
In Japan it's pretty much an institution that shops play an instrumental version of Hotaru no Hikari (which is basically Auld Lang Syne with different lyrics) when they're closing.
Most Japanese know it as "the closing song"
I introduced my local restaurant owner to Mongolian Techno and the late night bar flies and some of the kitchen staff have never forgiven me. He won't admit if he plays it for himself, or because of them :)
eg https://youtu.be/9uMtnH7cABg for the curious.
It's 3am and we're arguing some insipid minutae over technically illegal tequila shots while one drunk girl is breaking it down on the tiny dance floor :)
this is awesome!
We did this where I bartended as well. Generally 15-20 minutes after serving the last drink of the night.
The goal wasn’t to offend or clear out 100% of the customers - just make a large enough portion decide that outside might be more comfortable/conducive than inside. The 20 or so customers who were fine with the cacophony were easy enough to wrangle manually, and also generally either people we knew well .
I play disco music to keep the kids off my lawn.
A live music venue near me plays this when it's time for people to GTFO:
I was at a coffee shop once that was playing metal while my writing group was meeting there and I just thought they had excellent taste (it was not near closing time)
Carissa's Wierd used to put cacophony at the end of some of their songs to clear the house out as well
That reminds me of the "speech jammer", which won an Ignobel Prize last decade. It's an acoustic gun that combines a directional microphone and speaker array with a delay, tripping up the speaker.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/shut-up-speech-jammer-among-201...
I've recently become a convert to this kind of thinking. The person invited the public to join in when they decided to have a public speakerphone call. If they don't want my responses or laughter, they get annoyed and stop the behavior I was finding annoying in the first place.
I don't even have to act like I'm bothered by it, or that I find their behavior offensive. They change their behavior because they are bothered by mine.
How is that different than two people talking in person? Do you interrupt them as well?
Yup. Online too! I have no qualms about adding my two cents to any loud public conversations.
Do you think having your conversation on speakerphone in public is the same as talking to someone?
People talking to each other in person tend to modulate their voices to match the context. People talking on speakerphone tend to crank the volume and shout.
And the person on the other end of the line often doesn't realize how uncivil the situation is. They might know they're on speakerphone, but they actually can't see that they're interrupting the trains of thought of dozens of people around them. This means the content of the conversation is more likely to be inappropriate for public consumption, making it even more distracting for the forced participants.
The person holding the speakerphone is to blame, of course, but they often seem to go into a state of pathological flow where they're almost as oblivious as their conversation partner.
Plus devices are tinny and grate. Watching a video on the phone of someone speaking is much more annoying than someone speaking in person, even at the same volume.
I think this is the only meaningful point being made in this thread.
The sound from a phone speaker is annoying, more so, than a typical in person talking. To me the solution lies somewhere in fixing that to make it sound more natural.
Everyone else claiming that some how having “loud” conversation is rude, feels like they’ve fallen into some anti-social hole… we are literally the only animal to have developed complex spoken language… it’s part of our humanity.
It’s all context. Some cultures are loud, some are quiet; some people are loud, some are quiet; some places are supposed to be loud, and so on.
The people being quiet in an normally-loud place create no problems. The people being loud in a normally-quiet place are causing problems for others by violating the quiet.
Loud people also tend to be oblivious to this and then get defensive when it’s pointed out. Not always - I’ve known some naturally-loud people who had figured out that being shushed meant they were in the wrong.
No, loud conversation on a train during commuter hours really is rude where I live.
Most patrons have a conversation at a normal volume where the words are clear to their conversation partner but not to people sitting further away.
Speaking loudly enough to be understood from a significant distance is rude because it prevents other people from having their own conversations, and it forces people who are not having a conversation to listen to you. Speaking at an appropriate volume is not anti-social, it is pro-social: other people can't be social themselves if you're too loud.
The unwritten rules loosen up at night, during events, or at other times when there's a boisterous crowd.
For speakerphone-appropriate situations (e.g. being alone or with people that all want to participate in a call), yes, that would be great.
For everything else, the solution is to STFU. People blasting reels or having rambling non-essential phone calls in public transport is detrimental to everybody's stress level and by extension mental and physical health. I'd love to see it banned and the ban actually enforced.
Shout out to the GGT 101 bus driver that made the annoying passenger on some endless legal/business call actually shut up with a polite but firm "Sir, this is a bus, not a call center". Best trip across the Golden Gate Bridge I've ever had.
I think I've had that driver (or we were on the same bus!) because I remember this happening on that bus when I took it as well.
To the larger point about loud conversations -- any conversations above what is appropriate to the situation, even in person conversations, are annoying. Ever go to a restaurant and you're able to hear the loud table across the room because they're yelling while everyone else is speaking at a normal volume? Highly annoying. "Who ordered the mojito? Monique ordered the mojito!" I'm just trying to enjoy a cocktail and talk with my partner, not listen to your cacophony.
Doubly annoying if you have a speech processing disorder of any kind. I already have a hard time understanding people on one side of my head, I don't need to also be picking up someone's loud voices interrupting my attempts to listen.
No, the loudness is a whole separate dimension. 99% of the time, there's no need to be loud in public. Not when you're talking on the phone (the microphones on a phone work great!), not when you're having a conversation with one or two other people close to you. Not when talking to Siri (etc). You can talk quietly in a place that isn't very loud, and in a place like an airport you can talk just loud enough to be clearly heard -- there's no need to shout or to project your voice.
There are exceptions to this -- of course nobody expects you to worry about your volume at a concert between sets, at a sporting event, etc. But people who speak very loudly everywhere are annoying to everyone around them.
It's similar to the distinction between a driver having a conversation with a passenger in a vehicle vs. the same driver having a phone call, even in a hands-free / speakerphone mode.
The passenger will be far more aware of context and circumstances, including traffic or other hazards, and will generally adapt to those surroundings. The remote party simply has no access to those cues.
(And yes, some passengers may be oblivious, for various reasons, including but not limited to children. I'm discussing the general case.)
A half conversation is a lot more disruptive because your brain try to fill in the gap of information.
This comment chain is talking about people using speakerphone, though, meaning they hear both sides of the conversation
In theory yes, but in practice they usually have the speaker up far higher than they are speaking themselves so we do only hear one side clearly.
I think the high distractability is a trifecta of volume, non-naturallness of the sound (compression etc: feeling out of place in the space) and this point.
If their voices sounded shrill/unnaturally amplified/too loud, definitely. Listening to an annoying conversation on speakerphone is 10x more annoying than when it's face-to-face.
How do you deal with the small possibility that the offending person is unhinged (since they’ve already chosen to throw out societal mores out the window) and could physically hurt you?
It’s a two-way street.
I used to have to deal with unhinged people on the regular and one of the techniques that keep the peace and stay safe is to present an edge that gives the vibe that you may be more unhinged.
My dad used to run housing projects, and my uncle was an assistant principal at one of the most violent schools in New York City. They were like Jedi masters of presence. They had stories that were absolutely insane.
It is pure game theory. An aggressive person expects no bad outcomes from his passive victim. If they get a signal that their own outcome may be not that good, even marginally, this very often changes their behaviour.
That's why the advice to act submissively presented as "avoiding confrontation" is often the wrong advice.
You are not seeking confrontation, but you should signal that you are ready for confrontation. Stops aggressive behaviour very often.
This is dangerous advice.
You need to read the situation very carefully:
Antisocial behavior is often an attempt to gain status in the subjects in-group. Breaking rules in a way conveys power.
Violence against members of the out-group is an even more effective way to display dominance and hence gain status.
Unless you play a repeated game with the other person there is little to gain for you by initiating conflict.
Even if you assume you have something to gain, always consider the other person might have little to lose and ( my opinion) never display aggression you are not willing to back up.
Sources: 1. Rory Miller: ”Meditations on Violence”
2. Life experiences, that match 1’s observations
The advice is not about initiating a conflict. It is about not to appear an easy victim in order not to provoke aggression.
But life is always about fight-or-flight, so flight should remain an option, very often the best one.
By not signalling readiness to fight back, you increase probability of aggression by removing all costs to the potential perpetrator from their calculation.
This binary classification is what is dangerous in this case.
“Are you looking at my girl?”
1. “Fuck off, if you want to live”.
2. Try to run.
Both options are valid but you miss the: “Just zoning out mate. Hard day at work, you know? Boss dogged my pay and I have to muster up the courage to tell the misses. She’s been talking about leaving and taking the kids …”
Violence can arise at many different levels of the classical hierarchy of needs.
Existencial: A crack head robber in a crisis, needing to feed their habit, is hard to deter by threat. For them it is life or death, for you it is just money.
Self actualisation : Many serial killers preferred easy victims. Looking ready to defend one self most likely would dissuade them.
Social: A member of a social group, trying to establish status by conflict with an outsider? Looking tough might achieve just the opposite of what one intends. But being a type of non-target, simply because one is outside of the established hierarchy can work really well.
My perspective is probably skewed: In my by now admittedly boring life, violence is usually social and best side stepped.
Anectodal evidence, but 3 out of 4 bullies left me alone after I punched them back just a single time. The 4th got backup for the next time he jumped me, so it can backfire.
> The 4th got backup for the next time he jumped me, so it can backfire.
But was there a next time after that, or did they stop after getting their revenge once? If they did stop, and assuming you didn’t receive any permanent damage, you still won the interaction long term.
How did you manage to acquire /four/ bullies?
1. This was over the course of almost 20 years; one in elementary school, two in junior-high, one in high school
2. I'm an insufferable know-it-all.
You deserve a muffin for the way you delivered it
Unfortunately this quite reasonable observation has been mangled by pop culture and memes into "be aggressive yourself".
It also fails to account for there being different sorts of aggressive people.
That's a good point. There's alot of weird stuff out there about this, especially with regard to weapons. There's a balance between being aggressive and not a victim. If you tip too much on the "aggressive" side, you become a threat.
If you work with dogs it's very obvious with them as they are so empathic and attuned to humans. If you are afraid, they will try to take over. If you present as in control, they accept your control. If you are a threat, they respond as they see it. It happens between other animals too -- we're all seen reels of family pets chasing off bears or tiny chihuahuas chasing off German Shepards. People aren't dogs, but I think the comparison has some merit.
Speak softly and carry a big stick.
> They had stories that were absolutely insane.
Don't leave us hanging.
lol, Sure! Here’s one that was one of the crazier ones that I remember from my dad. There were a bunch of people complaining about smells coming from an apartment. The dude was a little out there and some sort of religious practitioner.
The workers were afraid of the guy, but he hadn’t really done anything except be weird and creepy. So he ended up going up with a few folks to check it out. The dude was capturing (many) wild animals and boiling their blood. So much so that it was condensating on the ceiling.
The dude opened the door and came at them with a bloody machete. He was babbling something about his mother, and I guess as it was told dad just softly said something along the lines of “Your mom sent us and she is not happy with what is happening here, and I think you know that.” I guess the guy stopped in his tracks, dropped the machete and started bawling.
He was a special guy and made a point to treat people fairly and with respect. They’d kick out drug dealers and people who’d terrorize neighbors with dogs and such. The local street dealers beat up some guy who tried to steal his car because being diligent in the buildings was keeping their families safe. He’d take me down as a kid in the summer to hang out and help out with kids programs. It was profoundly meaningful to me as I got to understand that we are all really the same.
I love this, thank you for sharing. I imagine that position gives you an exposure to humanity that many can't handle with that kind of grace and constitution. We surely need more people like him.
Yes, please give us some!
Personally, it's not worth living in fear of that small chance. If you're alone and they're visibly on drugs or something then yeah, better to just move. Otherwise we just let people get away with bad behavior.
It's illegal for them to hurt you.
> It's illegal for them to hurt you.
A well-known inhibitor for the unhinged.
I wish I had the social awareness to troll [the right] people [well] in the moment like this. I've misjudged the dangerous ones enough, find that has blocked my words.
It's the being in prison for years which truly inhibits them.
Is that why our prisons sit empty?
For the benefit of the next victim, maybe. The unhinged are famously forward-thinking. Hopefully you report their crime after the fact and it's met with a favorable result.
All to say: "May the odds...", etc.
Diet, exercise, and physical training, probably?
Just lift weights, or say it’s just a prank I guess
Sidled up next to the guy and said loudly, “Mr Smith? Mr Smith? The mistress is ready for you now!”
It's my fantasy to do this. Congrats on having the courage.
My friend does this and I feel the same way. I could never bring myself to do this, I cant even smile at people
Fun solution! But what do you do if the person is listening to loud music? There’s nothing to comment there.
This is a good way to shanked on the D.C. Metro.
Kind of a funny day to post this (WMATA just released data showing crime rates at a 25-year low)
Sounds like time to send in the National Guard.
25 year low is still an order of magnitude higher than a developed country.
I have do idea about DC but I don't trust crime rate stats - a lot might be unreported.
In NYC last year someone burnt someone else to death while they sat, relaxed and watched, and in a seperate incident a person died died and someone else had sex with them afterwards.
It could that be crime is lower or it could be that insane brutality has become normalized.
Crimes stats famously get massaged. However murders are hard to downgrade.
<Renee Good's family joined the chat>
But do you have reason to believe that crime is reported less often now than in the past?
In the style of cheap tiktoks: "There are two types of people...". My wife loves listening to her phone on max volume, but it sounds so bad compared to half decent speakers.
Also what's up with the people hiking (by themselves) with a bluetooth speaker. You're by yourself, in nature. If you want to listen to music wear headphones!!
Also why are people using speaker phones in public places at max volume. The speaker in your phone is designed to deliver the sound directly to your ear, probably at higher fidelity.
I'm loving the fact that battery technology will eventually eliminate weed wackers.
Sorry if I sound cranky, I find loud noises challenging.
It's not unreasonable to expect certain behavior in a shared space.
I'm really not sure where some of the other people replying to your comment are coming from. Forcing every human and animal you come across to listen to what you're listening to is selfish. Full stop. And not doing it costs $0, which preempts any question of resources.
Sometimes I would really rather not have the outside world isolated or noise cancelled while I'm listening to music... so I sorta get it?
But also, for all the reasons described, I just use transparency modes if I want that. That way nobody else has to hear my poor taste in music.
There are so many types of headphones that don't isolate much, including the cheapest crappy on-ears from the walkman era, there's really no excuse.
And on the few occasions where I've had no other option, it made so much more sense to set my phone to low volume and bring it close to my ear instead of holding it iut and maxing the volume.
And if I need to talk as well, many people don't know this, but there's a second smaller speaker on the opposite end of the phone, approximately one mouth-ear distance away from the microphone.
You touched a nerve for me — folks hiking with Bluetooth speakers. My god that grinds my gears. I can see an argument for playing music (at reasonable volume) while relaxing at a camp site, but on the trail it’s as aggravating as a dirt bike or snowmobile ripping along near by.
In potentially-dangerous-animal country (e.g. grizzly bears, mountain lions, etc), it could be a safety mechanism...I was told repeatedly you need to make some kind of distinctive noise regularly so they won't get startled by you rounding a bend.
those people, i've encountered them too, don't give a shit about anything let alone being safe around wildlife. If prey distress calls could be confused with music they'd be blaring that just as well.
That's what "bear bells" are for...in bear country.
Mountain lions are avoidant at all times unless it's a mother with cubs and even then they'll let you know well in advance.
Otherwise, just normal conversation, your smell with even a light breeze, and the vibrations on-trail will alert all animals to your presence.
In other words, the "trail music" theory is bullshit. They just want to listen to their music.
> Mountain lions are avoidant at all times
Actually sometimes they stalk people but I guess that's neither here nor there because bear bells aren't going to help in that situation.
I've heard of "being followed" by a mountain lion out of curiosity or, perhaps, scavenging when ill, but never a full-day stalk.
There was a recent death in our "backyard" though https://vt.co/news/us/details-emerge-solo-hiker-killed-by-mo... that was, clearly, the result of a planned attack by a teenage male so, perhaps, their behavior is changing.
Still, it's so rare, we don't have enough modern data.
Bear bells have been shown to not be effective.
Cite?
In some parks, there use is required by-law.
Given that they've been in continuous use for centuries I question the conclusion that they're not effective, but I'm open to altering my opinion backed-up with data.
lol.
that's like harley riders with unmuffled motors "for safety".
On the other hand, I remember being in japan and watching some construction vehicles in tokyo. They were surprisingly quiet. After a while I realized what it was - in the united states all construction vehicles have these annoying "beep-beep-beep" sounds while they're working (for safety).
I wonder if one day they can play those only when someone walks nearby or play in some technologically quieter way.
In France I see (and hear) more and more use of a special type of warning device, "le cri de lynx" that reduces sonic pollution by building sites.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=BljL3XO0fyg&pp=0gcJCTIBo7VqN5t...
It does remind me of a video from Tom Scott about the use of white noise for reversing trucks. It has multiple benefits over the old beeping sound, including being easily able to hear the direction the sound is coming from. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fa28lIGuxq8
Sadly I don’t speak French and Searching for whatever this is isn’t working.
If it’s noise cancelling it sounds amazing.
Can you further expand?
It's the noise you hear at about the one minute mark when the digger is reversing: https://youtu.be/BljL3XO0fyg?t=59
Actual cri du lynx: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KtsdVQWGibQ
Oh this is horrible.
We don’t want people run over by reversing vehicles, but also, if I had to listen to that every day, I’d leap in front of them.
IMO, in person it's much nicer on the ears than the old single-tone beep that they used to have. It's less jarring and easier to locate where the noise is coming from, ye olde beep seemed to come from everywhere at once.
> while they're working (for safety).
Should only be while they're backing up. It signals to anyone around that the vehicle is in reverse. At least the ones I'm familiar with.
> some technologically quieter way.
I'm not going to watch the video linked in sibling comments right now, but "pulsing loud static" is a pretty common alternative to beeping around me; especially in the big citie. Kind of a big shush shush noise: sometimes it sounds a little like hydraulics working which is fine because if you hear those, something big is happening and you should pay attention.
Anyway, the real nice thing is it's loud and attention catching near the source, but it seems to disipate faster than beeps, so you don't really hear it when it's not relevant.
These people probably don't do it for this reason, but you're correct, at least when it comes to bears.
Huh? I’ve never met anyone in the backcountry that played music to keep predators away. Even when forced to hike at dusk, the primary risk is quietly stumbling on a predator out stalking, or worse, a predator’s offspring. At most you clap every so often, maybe talk/sing to yourself, or dangle some stuff from your pack at higher risk times. Animals will do the hard work of avoiding you When you’re nearby, but its quite unnecessary to notify everything with in a 1km radius of your presence.
This is my reason for blasting music from my bicycle. Feels less rude than clicking a bell at the pedestrians and somewhat more effective at attracting attention.
That is definitely the wrong thing to do. It isn't rude to use the bell, and as a pedestrian I appreciate a single ring (obviously, don't ring like a madman either). Playing music loudly in a public space is way more rude than using your bicycle bell.
Too many close calls with inattentive pedestrians in my area. I ring, no move, or worse, they get startled, and turn around into the middle of the bike lane. If I have to choose between coming off as rude and keeping my brain enclosed, I know what to do.
You need to ring when you are still some way away, so they have time to react, and if they don't you can slow down and ring a second time. And travel at an appropriate speed for the location.
(I have an ebike, so this is especially important. Mine is a legal one: 25 km/h max, 250 W, etc. If yours is faster, this is even more important.)
It's great for announcing that an asshole is approaching.
“Heeeeere I come!!!” Boom psst boom psst waka waka
Better still, a nice free hub. If you don’t pedal, it’s noisy, if you back pedal it sounds urgent.
As an upside, your better get good at hill climbing as freewheeling or backpedaling up hill takes some practice.
We don't have bears or mountain lions where I live but mountain bikers still do this.
It's amazing how HN readers are immune to second degree and fell flat into the trap.
How about don’t ride on the sidewalk or any pedestrian path.
Right, I don't! it's the other way around where I live. Lots of pedestrians distractingly lolling about in the bike lane, maybe with a dog and a loose toddler too. So, music.
There are shared pedestrian/cyclist paths in some places.
Mixed bike/pedestrian paths and sidewalks are extremely common here in Sweden at least. Some are split into two halves, but mixed is more common.
I've heard many people say the cannot stand they way earbuds feel. Just like many people said they could not breath wearing a mask.
I can sympathize with this, but
1) earbuds are not the only headphone style
2) listening to speakers is not a necessity.
So fine if you don't want to use earbuds, but not necessarily fine to annoy those around you with music/talk shows or whatever sounds you want to introduce to the enviroment.
3) "I don't like this" / "I don't wanna" is not really an acceptable reason to be an antisocial ass.
Being in nature, all alone is not social though, is it? Why are people so frustrated? What am I missing?
FWIW, it is dangerous to wear headphones in the city and listen to music, but you can always wear only one side. It is not comfortable, but that is how you remain safe without being an ass.
> Being in nature, all alone is not social though, is it? Why are people so frustrated? What am I missing?
Let's say I'm out in the woods, being non social. And someone comes up the path, playing music loudly. Now I'm being annoyed by people again, which is what I was trying to avoid by being out in the woods. And they're usually on a motorized vehicle, even though motorized vehicles are prohibited on the path.
I'm not trying to tell people how to live their lives. If they want to apprechiate nature in silence, cool. If they want to listen to music, cool ... but it'd be nice if they used headphones and it would be acceptable if they had a speaker at reasonable volume, but when I can hear them before I can see them, it's really not cool.
If they want to walk with a friend and chat, that's ok too.
Transparency modes, bone conduction, lower volume.
Bone conduction is amazing!
I can confirm the earbuds thing. Not the mask thing. Modern jelly ended "earbuds" just feel awful. They irritate my sense of momentum, never stay in, and it constantly feels like I have altitude pressure buildup in my ear canal when I wear them. The old hard plastic first generation iPod style in-ear earphones however I have had no problem with. Gravity keeps those in place and so there isn't that constant pressure of expansion in your ears. Those or over-ear headphones are what should be recommended to people, and if neither of those options work then they're just using it as an excuse.
I found some good bone-conduction headphones... very comfy, only $35, Shokz-style. Full-day battery.
me too but I had to grow sideburns to cope with the wind
Maybe go without headphones and pay attention to your surroundings instead. I have zero patience for such excuses from people who choose to impose their preferences on other people.
> Maybe go without headphones and pay attention to your surroundings instead.
This. Even when you are seemingly quiet on a trail, 90% of wildlife are hiding from you. It’s amazing what happens when you stop and sit in complete silence for 5-10 minutes — a whole hidden world comes alive around you. 10/10, highly recommend.
> I have zero patience for such excuses from people who choose to impose their preferences on other people.
This as well. Somewhere along the way, civics teachings in America’s school left folks w/ the impression that the spirit of our liberty is, “It’s a free country, I can do what I want!”, rather of, “I have the liberty to pursue happiness, up until it infringes on the liberty for others to do so.”
To play devils advocate, telling other people to turn off thier music is also "imposing preferences on other people".
I do agree with what they're saying though.
If they aren’t a dick they can have their music, through headphones.
This is domething I realized riding my MTB by night in the forests in the mountains. Thanks to the reflection of all those eyes staring at your headlight you realize the sheer amount of wildlife there is hidden a few meters from you.
I can't stand the way earbuds feel. That's why I wear over-the-ear headphones or bone-conducting headphones. There are so many options for personal audio. Even if you're truly allergic to all of them, that doesn't give you the right to inflict your noise on others.
Imagine if everyone decided they were entitled to play their music on speakers. The result would be a cacophony where nobody can hear their own music and life is worse for everyone. People who play music in public spaces are claiming a common resource for their own exclusive use.
Sincerely - someone who's lived with 7 other people in a 3-bedroom house.
Nobody is forced to listen/watch stuff anyway. If you don't have the mean to do it quietly, you can just abstain yourself from doing it.
I'm one of those people - I find any "in-ear" headphone/earbud to be outrageously uncomfortable.
Great news - there are a TON of alternatives! You're still an asshat if you play loud music without regard for your surroundings.
My personal pick? Get a bone conduction headset (ex: Shokz or cheaper alternative). Comfortable, lightweight, waterproof, you can still hear your surroundings.
I've been using a Shokz pair of headphones off and on for around 5 years and while they're great indoors I wouldn't really recommend them outside. Due to the city noise you'll probably tend to crank the volume pretty high (without realizing) and give yourself hearing damage over time.
Same problem with anything in-ear. I have two pairs of Shokz that I use for work (OpenComm) and play (OpenRun). I thought they would be a gimmick, but 3 years later, I love them and use them daily.
Fun hack: when I travel I prefer my over-ear noise cancelling Ankers, but they're bulky. So, for traveling light, I use Shockz and then silicone ear plugs to block out external sound on e.g. the airplane. Creates a little bit of a "swimming pool" effect acoustically, but works well and is tiny to carry.
I have a Shokz brand two-piece headset (the OpenFit 2+ i think?) that just wraps around the outside of the ear, with the actual speaker part held just outside the ear canal. I can't do in-ear buds either, but these just work for me. Doesn't even feel like anything's there.
I did try their bone-conduction headphones, but the quality was slightly worse and they didn't feel as nonexistent to wear.
Why would earbuds be the defacto standard here? Get headphones. They're great, I promise. I'll even send a link https://www.bestbuy.com/product/sennheiser-momemtum-4-wirele...
Even fewer people want to wear earmuffs while hiking.
There are so many styles and those people can choose one consistent with their muff preferences.
Tough shit. "I don't like how earbuds feel" does not mean you should feel free to add noise pollution to everyone else's day.
Regardless, earbuds are only one type of headphone. I'm sure someone with an earbud sensitivity can find another type that works well. And if not, again: tough shit; no music for you.
There are a lot of different types of headphones.
I recommend Koss Porta Pros with Yaxi pads.
Just get the shower style ones.
I think it’s cultural to do this or something.
definitely not cultural
now, imagine showing up to a hike and the person youre meeting whips one of these out and proceeds to blast rap music. its happened to me and it feels like Seinfeld but 2020s
Be prepared to counter with Norwegian black metal!
It is absolutely a cultural thing.
Yeah, you're really not going to find many people blasting gustav mahler in the forest for example. It's always pop music.
this guy is a white cop and our mothers are sisters
so is this white guy culture, cop culture or what culture?
in my experience its nearly always college bros with fanny pack speakers. college bro who will grow up to be a white cop culture maybe
I'm with you. IMO sound pollution is no different than 2nd hand smoke. IMO It should not be anyone's right to impose upon others, especially when there are lower externality options. Wear headphones.
"Not everyone owns headphones" is such a dumb response because 1. This entertainment is purely optional (not needed for survival) and 2. There are $4 headphones on amazon making me believe in cheaper/poorer markets you could get them for about 1/2 that.
Go to SF. people carrying 24inch speakers on their back blaring music walking down market street
Or the DJ school at 20th and Mission playing music outdoors every Friday
Secondhand smoke is toxic and physically damages your body and enters your bloodstream.
Someone playing music is annoying and does not physically harm you in any way.
These are not remotely the same thing. There is a clear bright line between them.
Unwanted noise affect stress level which has an impact in health.
It is not just harmless annoyance and not everyone is equal in that regard.
C'mon now.
"<insert literally anything you feel like> affect stress level which has an impact in health [so do what I want]"
What _can't_ you use that argument for?
It stresses me out and distracts me from what I'm doing. You have no right to do that and I will ruin your day if you try.
As long as I'm within the restrictions of any ordinance regarding noise level/place/time of day, I have no obligation to be silent in public places.
You don't have a right to freedom from annoyances, within reason.
That's why the person wrote the app in the link of this thread. So that when you annoy us, we'll echo it back in your face at full volume. And you have no right to complain since you just approved not being free from us doing this to you.
Someone playing music is annoying and does not physically harm you in any way.
Tell that to someone wearing hearing aids or implants. I'm fairly sure, they feel differently.
I find it absurd that music in cafés and restaurants has become so loud that it’s hard to have conversations with the people on your table. Sound pollution is a real thing.
I find that sound design is famously awful in most public spaces!
For example, train stations tend to have high ceilings, so announcements are loud and full of echoes and reverbs. [0]
I think of sound a bit like WiFi: it’s better to have tons of low power speakers everywhere delivering a clear and non aggressive sound, than a handful of screaming speakers in a tight space: if you’re next to it it’s too loud, and far away it’s drown in reverb.
My guess is that architects and everyone else either don’t know or don’t care.
[0]: like the new Munich Main Station under construction, slide 2: https://entdecken.muenchen.de/en/station/26-4/
I bet it's by design. If you actually make things pleasant you might accidentally create a third place and no one can profit from that!
In restaurants it doesn’t make sense, because you usually have the table for 2 hours after which the staff will remind you it’s time to leave (in Germany).
For cafe, sure!
To be contrarian: If people are comfortable they stick around and keep ordering more stuff.
If people are uncomfortable, they can predict how often they can turn the table over and get another party in there.
If I'm uncomfortable, I can predict how seldom I will be coming back.
"with this music we are a happening trendy place!"
(and nobody will notice during slow times that we donn't actually have that many customers)
The night clubs I went to in the nineties had loud music and low lights so talking to anyone was a challenge.
That's true of nightclubs today, and I think that's just expected and normal? I'd go to a club to hear music, dance, and drink. Sure, sometimes you might stop to try to talk a little bit, but that's not the primary activity.
I went to nightclubs because other people did and to meet women. The music was pretty much all the same with a beat behind it, and the drink was watered down.
It's almost as if nightclubs are set up to prevent human interaction.
hey, it's hard for the employees to enjoy their muzak over the din of all of your conversations!
It's because they don't want you sitting there for any longer than it takes to eat your meal. They deliberately have tile floors and hard walls to amplify the noise.
I get that, but what about the next time I think about where to go?
Floors are more about cleaning, tbh.
> I'm loving the fact that battery technology will eventually eliminate weed wackers.
I've moved to all electric lawn equipment. Snow blower, lawn mower, weed wacker, leaf blower. They all work great, are quieter, and I don't have to deal with carburetors and oil ever again.
Side benefit: Our electric push mower has enough LED lights on it for some reason that I can mow after sunset. I've mowed the grass at 9pm without disturbing anyone and its magic.
I only moved halfway. I had some electronic failure in one of my more expensive battery powered purchases, and the thing was just dead. There's no servicing it for any reasonable cost. For more important things, I'd rather have a two stroke engine I can work on myself. For everything else, battery operated is the way to go.
My battery-powered lawnmower died once.
After I took the handle apart and undid some connections, I diagnosed it as a bad switch.
I fixed it by making a small hole in the switch body with a hand-held drill bit, shaking some water out of it, spraying in some Corrosion-X, and exercising it while watching its performance improve on my meter.
In terms of cost: It took about 40 minutes to get from "WTF?" to "Fixed!", along with maybe 3 cents of the magic spray stuff and some tools I already owned.
>Also what's up with the people hiking (by themselves) with a bluetooth speaker. You're by yourself, in nature. If you want to listen to music wear headphones!!
I'm baffled by this too, but I think some people get accustomed to just having a soundtrack around them at all times, like they're living in a Hollywood movie. It gets to the point where they actually sleep with something always on (in the old days that would be a TV, not sure today. Probably a podcast)
> what's up with the people hiking (by themselves) with a bluetooth speaker. You're by yourself, in nature. If you want to listen to music wear headphones!!
Finally, it's my time to shine. OK, so I do this. Granted, I hike spots where I rarely run into other people. I listen to music out in nature because:
- I enjoy it and it creates a mood.
- I don't wear headphones because I want to be comfortable but I also want to hear the environment (for safety and enjoyment reasons).
- It also lets bears and cougar know I am around.
Finally, nature isn't new to me. I've spent significant amounts of time in the remote woods alone -- even living in the woods for some time. Not that it's boring by any stretch, but it's also not a novel experience to me.
But yeah, it'd be rude to be doing it where other people are trying to enjoy nature.
I can appreciate the reasons you have for wanting it. The only problem is when it affects my hiking experience. It annoys the crap out of me to hear it coming loudly from down the path when I just want to listen to nature.
Like the other commenter posted, you can use open earbuds, which I use as well for the same reasons.
As far as wild cats go, they are already pretty good at knowing you are there already without a speaker. Where I live there are many mountain lions and bobcats but I have never seen one close up, same in the California Sierra. In terms of bears, if they aren't black bears then yeah although it depends on where you are hiking. If it's in the backcountry, please pause it when I come by.
I've recently started trying open ear phones for other reasons and I've found the current state of the art pretty good in terms of sound quality. I use Nothing's open ears, but I'm sure there are many others that are equally good. They won't act as cougar alerters, but if you want to listen to both music and the environment where others are around, the tech is ready
> But yeah, it'd be rude to be doing it where other people are trying to enjoy nature.
Right, so you are a hiking music-player, but also a person who is sensitive to the experiences of others and not a douche. I think this thread is about the douchey people who do this in much more crowded spaces than you're used to. Maybe they have the same justifications as you have when you're alone, but they just don't hold water for me when there are other people around.
> Also what's up with the people hiking (by themselves) with a bluetooth speaker. You're by yourself, in nature. If you want to listen to music wear headphones!!
Washington Department of Natural Resources recommended bluetooth speaker playlists for hiking:
https://unofficialnetworks.com/2022/08/20/washington-roasts-...
> Also what's up with the people hiking (by themselves) with a bluetooth speaker.
Boy, that one really gets to me when I'm on the trail. Both hikers and mountain bikers are guilty of that. Also, the people with their AirPods in oblivious to anything going on around them...
At least AirPods have an excellent transparency mode
So, people playing music around them is bad, and people playing music just to themselves is also bad?
Yes, but they're different kinds of bad. People playing music publicly are being obnoxious to everyone else, while people playing music privately are putting themselves at risk. (Not so much when hiking, but IMHO wearing headphones while cycling in traffic is suicidal.)
> Also what's up with the people hiking (by themselves) with a bluetooth speaker. You're by yourself, in nature. If you want to listen to music wear headphones!!
I've not done this, and I don't think I would ever do this, but I can sympathize with having the idea that they don't want to be so isolated from nature so as to have headphones blocking out the sounds of the world around them dampened, but also feel like it would be super sweet if they could listen to Bowie right now.
It's also been shown that having music reduces the feeling of loneliness, having similar effects to having had a conversation recently, so if a person is hiking along perhaps it offers them companionship?
_If_ I ever did this (I wouldn't) I'd probably have it down to a whisper such that you would hardly be able to make it out unless you were right beside me.
What are you doing out in nature if you need to be around music and feel lonely? Stay in the city, leave the country to people who want to actually get a break from the city for their mental health.
In my case, listening to other people's music damages my mental health. If I encounter someone on a trail with music (this has not happened here in the northeast to me yet) they'll encounter a string of direct to-face insults from me.
Lol please don't gate keep "nature". As if the only people who play music on a hike are from or belong in cities.
The nice thing about the great outdoors is that there is plenty of space for you and me, even if I were to play music you can audibly detect from a meter away.
Look, I hope you find some other ways than insulting people to express your displeasure in the future. That'll damage both the mental health of the person your speaking to and your own!
Take care out there!
When you are hiking there is actually a ton of noise/songs to listen to. Especially birds.
I've found myself wishing I had a bluetooth speaker crossing meadows in bear country. It gets old singing Yellow submarine's chorus for the 35th time. Bears will hide if they hear you, if you surprise them and they get scared you might have a bad time.
I spent a good part of the summer weekends in the mountains which are an hour's drive from my place.
Every minute someone in the distance would be flooring whatever loud vehicle they were driving/riding - mostly motorcycles, but I've heard a few cars.
Their enjoyment is everything, screw everyone else.
Hopefully the rest of the world will eventually follow the Netherlands attempts to limit noise in cities by design
I get you, I also prefer quiet.
But I have a question:
> I'm loving the fact that battery technology will eventually eliminate weed wackers.
Is this a non-sequitur, or a euphemism/figure of speech/etc. which I have never previously encountered?
I think the following line puts it into more context:
> I find loud noises challenging.
They're basically comparing other people's speaker music to noise pollution. Two stroke engines can be heard from a long way off, and I've got box fans that are louder than my electric weedwhacker.
Just unsolicited sharing of their own personal preferences with the rest of the forum readers
I think he means that electric handheld lawn equipment should be much quieter than gas-fired lawn equipment which is an infamous nuisance
I am with you on speakers on a nature hike, but I think the line blurs a bit in a city context. As long as it's not extremely loud, I find it slightly more difficult to hate on the person playing some music and moderate volume while trucks and loud motorcycles go by. If we had less of a car culture, I might feel differently about it, but there's so much noise already that in that context I kind of shrug my shoulders at it.
In a city context it's still obnoxious. In my experience these people are playing their music loudly. Like you can hear it from 2-3 blocks away, even with vehicle noise.
And the vehicle noise is expected and "necessary", in that it's a street, and of course there will be noisy cars and motorcycles on it. The noise is also easier to treat as a background buzz and tune out. Loud music is not any of those things.
Cities are a delicate balance when it comes to noise: if you live in a city, you have to acknowledge that you're living in a densely-populated place with lots of other people around, and make your peace with the fact that there will be noise. But at the same time, each individual should also do their best to avoid polluting the air with unnecessary noise. And blasting music from a giant bluetooth speaker in a backpack is 100% unnecessary, rude, and selfish.
I don't think this is really the idea behind this post
It's about enclosed spaces (airport) or open, quiet ones (hiking)
TLDR it feels better to announce yourself with some (non aggressive) music than triggering a bell.
I wouldn't use that when hiking but it is true that I sometimes use a bluetooth speaker when riding my bicycle in the city.
I don't put it at full volume but a lot of pedestrians and their dog seem to be attracted by dedicated bicycle lanes when they are built on the same level as the sidewalk. It is a good way to warn people of my presence without using a bell. Using a bell sometimes sounds a bit rude because people associate it to the use of the car horn which has become a proxy for insults instead of the warning device it used to be.
[1] I used to think pedestrians were doing it to annoy cyclists on purpose but judging by their often suprised reaction. I think it is just an unconscious behavior. Apart from bicycle lanes which aren't well marked, it is probably because the bicycle lanes are usually a smoother surface and thus more agreeable to the feet than the sidewalk thus people tend to walk on them natually.
I was in downtown seattle recently and these homeless people play music on giant bluetooth speakers.
It was kind of surreal - sketchy looking person playing high-pitched voice female vocals (imagine k-pop).
Every person is just a few missed meals and showers away from being a "sketchy looking person" even k-pop lovers. The majority of Americans are precariously close to ending up homeless.
I used to work in Pioneer Square, and there was a guy with a "portable" (think desktop PC in a milk crate, bungie corded to a foldable dolly) gaming pc playing on the regular. Granted this is back a bit.
Seattleites are a resourceful lot.
If I'm hiking or cycling alone through the woods with high bear populations, I will often play some music to alert them to prevent an unpleasant encounter.
I also sound cranky a lot lately when complaining about loud or unwelcome sounds in public spaces. So this project (and your comment) resonates with me.
Also yes, hiking with a bluetooth speaker is particularly galling. you're in nature! For that reason I've been considering buying (or building) a portable bluetooth jammer. I wouldn't do all the time, no reason to punish someone using wireless earphones respectfully. It'd need to have a trigger for JIT intervention.
I've a smallish lawn so I've just been using wired yard tools my whole life. Have to be careful to mind the extension cord but it's dead simple and zero-maintenance. My lawnmower is just about old enough to run for President. Just make sure you get the right cable gauge for your mower, since you're dealing with long-enough runs that resistance loss in the cable is substantial and Home Depot just wants to sell you 100 foot 16 gauge thing that probably shouldn't be anywhere near a proper lawnmower.
there are many sibling/child comments here touching the bluetooth speaker topic.
obviously there are numerous people blasting those in public places in waay too high volume.
sometimes when I ride bicycle in non-car road (cycle/hiking paths around luxembourg) i put not-too-loud music playing on phone speaker (about 70% volume) both for vibes and also for safety. -- as there are people walking which may be obstructed by the bushes or other oncoming cyclists.
for the vibes part, i am really hoping smart-glasses or similar equipment to be more common, as i got echo frames last year, i am quite happy about the vibe it adds when i play background music (just to myself) in different occasions. (even though quality is not great)
many people mentioned headphones & earbuds, but i do not see them as the solution for nature/hiking related situations;
- (partial) blocking of external sounds, even if there is no noise cancellation, it dims outside sounds like bike bells, engine sounds, other people yelling at you because you are in danger, ie. may cause accidents
- comfort & compatibility issues with other equipment. like hearing aid (maybe that's the reason some people blasting away such high volumes? -- maybe never hearing loss haven't diagnosed properly!). if you have a helmet, over-head headphones usually dont work, stuck with ear-buds. fit and comfort of these are quite difficult. even if you use over-head ones, cushions usually go bad quite fast due to mild sweating or contact with external air & humidity.
i really hope price of bluetooth-speaker or bone-speaker glasses will go down significantly in the future. this way, you don't obstruct external sounds, not add heavy or squishy things to your ear while adding your theme song on a moment.
---
obviously i mention these as a reasonable human being, who keeps their phone in silent 7/24, and all videos muted all the time (i also mute my laptop, as i hate hearing other people's zoom/chime calls constantly ringing throughout the day!)
The way I look at it when it comes to the comfort bits: if you aren't comfortable using headphones to listen to your music in a public place (for fit or safety or whatever reasons), then you don't get to listen to your music. It's just basic common courtesy. I find it mind-blowing that there are so many comments in this subthread supporting this sort of behavior.
I guarantee you that your 70% volume music while cycling is audible to people much farther from you than you think, and that many of those people are probably annoyed by it.
> Also what's up with the people hiking (by themselves) with a bluetooth speaker. You're by yourself, in nature. If you want to listen to music wear headphones!!
Wife is concerned about bears
> Also what's up with the people hiking (by themselves) with a bluetooth speaker. You're by yourself, in nature. If you want to listen to music wear headphones!!
I used to hold this same opinion. Unfortunately, times have changed and now everyone is constantly in their phones, isolated in their own universes, typically with earbuds or headphones. At least the obnoxious speaker dude is present; in a shared physical reality with the world around him. A lesser evil.
This is why god invented bone conducting headphones
That’s still not a shared experience.
> Also what's up with the people hiking (by themselves) with a bluetooth speaker. You're by yourself, in nature. If you want to listen to music wear headphones!!
Maybe they don't know of or don't have access to bone conducting earphones. Whatever they're listening to, that way they'd also still hear their environment.
>Maybe they don't know of or don't have access to...
Maybe they don't know of or don't have any access to any sense of boundaries, as if they skipped the infant stage of development where they should have learned that "mom" is another person with her own coequal set of needs. And anybody with the urge to push back on this notion, please cover the case where it might apply to you to.
If you can't listen to your music without polluting the noise landscape around you, then you don't get to listen to your music. The excuse you present is a selfish one.
Yea, with you on that one. Headphones are great at the house where I have a controlled environment. When I'm out and listening to things I'll typically only use one at a time because it's easy to miss very important, possibly deadly things.
They're obviously not the most affordable things around, but if you have an iPhone and spending ~US$250 on a pair of wireless earbuds won't unduly stress your budget, the transparency mode on AirPods Pro is great for this.
They are great. But… I tried them on a plane. It may have been full sound cancelling rather than transparency, and it works, and goes silent but it’s a weird silence. It sort of feels heavy, or loud.
Wearing headphones while hiking is uncomfortable, and wearing earbuds for any length of time is always uncomfortable - hiking or not. They also fall out.
As others have said - not really a big deal. Either get ahead of them and maintain a significant distance, or stay behind and do so.
It is a big deal. It means for a lot of people there's nowhere they can go to actually enjoy the sound of nature. The strategy of getting ahead or staying behind doesn't work when there are switchbacks or crowded trails. The strategy that does work is to get fit enough to go deep into the backcountry because the troglodytes that bring speakers to hikes lack the discipline to ever get that far.
> The strategy of getting ahead or staying behind doesn't work when there are switchbacks or crowded trails.
If a trail is crowded, you won't hear much of the sound of nature, whether someone is playing music or now.
It all depends on where you live, and what access you have. Nature is not far from me, so I have several options within an hour's drive.
No. This is YOUR problem. If you want to play your own music on a speaker, you're making your problem everyone else's problem. Grow up.
You are being needlessly triggered, to the point that you're not parsing the thread well.
1. I didn't say I do this. It's not my problem.
2. You're exaggerating by saying "everyone else's problem". As is clear from the thread, only certain people view it as a problem.
I also don't like people taking selfies on trails. But I know how not to have my contentment be affected by minor problems.
Learn to share the trail and live with others different from you.
No. Your first sentence is framed from the point of view of your own experience. Regardless, I will not tolerate sound pollution like this. It's one thing in the city, where noise is chronic and endemic. Bringing that into a natural setting is simply inconsiderate of others, and it is the inconsiderate person who must change their behavior, not the people who are being imposed upon.
There you go. Quite comfortable, don’t have to stick them inside your ears, and still allows you to perceive the sounds around you.
In the spirit of fairness, I’ll also share the cons from my experience: First is battery life isn’t as good as headphones. That’s somewhat obvious as they’re much smaller, but they will still last you the whole day so not really an issue for hiking. Second one is that because they don’t block outside sounds, they’re not appropriate for audiobooks/podcasts while walking in the city. Again, not an issue for hiking.
Whether they realize it or not, most of the population can't afford this. Cheap Bluetooth speakers are, well, cheap!
Then buy a cheaper brand. I just did a no-effort search on Amazon and found some under $30.
Additionally, “I can’t afford the alternative” is not a valid excuse to be an asshole to those around you.
What constitutes being an asshole is very much the point of contention in this thread. Your comment is borderline tautological.
> Cheap Bluetooth speakers are, well, cheap!
And so are cheap headphones.
Yes, you are a crank, but you are not alone. Either way, we should at least acknowledge the crankiness.
Not everyone owns headphones. Some people might have received the speaker as a gift or decided on the speaker instead of headphones. How people spend their time outdoors is not up to you or I to decide. If they want to listen to music from a bluetooth speaker, that's what they want to do. There's a lot more outdoors for you to use as well so rather that stewing, just find more outdoors. Especially on trails. Just keep going. Or wait until they have kept going. I've never seen a bluetooth speaker that's big enough for someone to be on a trail with that doesn't "go away" after a minute or so.
I have discussed the speaker on trails issue with friends, and we've noticed that the louder one's speaker is the shittier the music it is playing.
> How people spend their time outdoors is not up to you or I to decide. If they want to listen to music from a bluetooth speaker, that's what they want to do.
What if it interferes with my desire to NOT listen to their music on their bluetooth speaker?
> There's a lot more outdoors for you to use as well so rather that stewing
There are also many deep caves in which you can listen to music on speakers. Why aren't you going to these caves?
The societal contract is that your freedom stops where your neighbours freedom starts. This also applies to the noise you produce.
Often when I encounter a person loudly listening to music or videos on their phone in a cafe, it's because they are completely unaware of how loud they are or they obviously have some challenging psychological issues ( I live in SF ).
I have a lot of wired headphones I got off of Temu, I just give them a pair.
What % of the time does it work?
Any adverse experiences (e.g. punch in the face)?
How people spend their time outdoors is not up to you or I to decide.
If they're blasting music in a normally quiet place, they are deciding for me. You're literally giving priority to whoever chooses to be less considerate of others.
> How people spend their time outdoors is not up to you or I to decide.
Hiking trails and parks are public spaces, and we absolutely do get to decide how people spend their time there. I've seen parks and trails where the sign at the entrance/trailhead says no amplified music (among other restrictions). Selfish people of course ignore these signs and damage the experience for everyone around them.
> How people spend their time outdoors is not up to you or I to decide.
Oh no, it absolutely is. Societies have laws, and even just social norms, that don't stop applying "outdoors". Unless you're in the ocean, I suppose.
Pack out what you pack in. Stay on the trail. No loudspeakers. Very simple.
Of the three you mention, only one is the law in every public land place I've hiked.[1]
Staying on the trail is mostly a suggestion for your safety (and to preserve the area) - definitely not a law.
Ditto for loudspeakers. People often go into nature and throw concerts.
[1] OK - trails in state parks and perhaps some national parks likely have more rules. But trails in general public lands (BLM, forest, etc)? Not many.
This is willful misreading. They specifically also said “social norms”.
This “it’s not technically illegal so it’s not a problem” sentiment is unhealthy for civil societies. I for one would like basic social norms to be respected without law-enforcement being involved.
I was pointing out the pointlessness of invoking "laws" in this scenario. I'm not the one that brought it into the conversation.
As for social norms, one only has to read the comments to understand that there clearly isn't consensus on this point. People go to nature for many reasons - not all related to enjoying the sounds of nature. What dylan604 is pointing out is to be mindful of that.
> People go to nature for many reasons - not all related to enjoying the sounds of nature.
The issue that you seem to be (willfully?) ignoring is that in a shared space, there are actions that you can take that force others to "enjoy" the space in a way that's different than they'd like.
Someone wants to enjoy the space with music. Ok, they play music, so they're enjoying the space in the way they want. Great for them.
Someone else wants to enjoy the space more quietly, able to hear the sounds of nature around them. But the person above has decided for them that they are not permitted to enjoy the space that way.
This is the difference between "freedom to" and "freedom from". Unfortunately when you have the "freedom to" do whatever you want, you infringe on the "freedom from" of others. It's a balance, and I'm sad to see that it seems people are swinging that balance toward "freedom to" at the expense of others. When I was growing up, we used to call this "common courtesy", which seems to be much less common these days.
There are a lot of people who are loud about not wanting to follow social norms (which is expected when we're talking about people rudely being loud, I guess). It seems to be a point of pride. I don't get it but I've definitely seen it.
100%
I'd argue that unspoken rules apply even more strongly in actual outdoors setting, because a good number of those norms actually have serious consequences when violated. Anybody seriously hiking or offroading gets to save a non-zero number of behinds of people who ignored those rules, every single year.
And they also know they need to rely on those rules, because they might get them out of trouble too. The outdoors is not always friendly.
The "No speakers" thing is just the "let's try not be an ass to the same person who might need to pull me out of a ravine next" part of the rules.
I can assure you some of them also very much apply in the ocean.
This is probably the most perfect illustration of toxic empathy I have ever read.
> Not everyone owns headphones. Some people might have received the speaker as a gift or decided on the speaker instead of headphones. How people spend their time outdoors is not up to you or I to decide. If they want to listen to music from a bluetooth speaker, that's what they want to do. There's a lot more outdoors for you to use as well so rather that stewing, just find more outdoors. Especially on trails. Just keep going. Or wait until they have kept going. I've never seen a bluetooth speaker that's big enough for someone to be on a trail with that doesn't "go away" after a minute or so.
I am very open to the argument of "you do you", which is pretty much my philosophy also. But I do think there are /some/ limits to this, because some behaviors are inherently anti-social. My philosophy is more than "you do you" should apply to policy and regulation, meaning that we should not criminalize or directly punish anti-social behaviors that don't cause direct and immediate harm. But that definitely does not mean that we should not shame people for acting in completely inappropriate ways, or directly inform them that their behavior is unwelcome, or otherwise seek to ensure that we act to exist in spaces devoid of anti-social behavior.
I've had this same exact scenario happen, and I simply spoke to the person and told them to lower the volume, use headphones, or stop altogether because they were scaring away the wildlife that I was there to see and photograph. They apologized, lowered the volume, and we both went back to doing our own thing. Most people are reasonable, and act in anti-social ways due to lack of awareness not malice. We are both sharing the trail, and we are both there to experience nature, and that very well might include many different modalities (including accompanying music), but if someone is acting in a way that completely prevents me from enjoying nature I definitely have the right to say something, to complain about it, and to complain about it after the fact, and "you do you" is not a valid argument in response to that.
> Most people are reasonable, and act in anti-social ways due to lack of awareness not malice.
Sometimes. I’m pretty sure that very often it’s because they simply do not care that they are being rude/inconsiderate/whatever. But even the willfully rude will likely lower the volume if you ask them nicely because not caring about being rude is not the same as wanting confrontation.
I've been on both ends of this. One of the local parks allowed for permits to use amplified sound which we took advantage of about once a month weather permitting. Lots of complaints to the point I often interacted with police. We showed them the permit, we'd show dB readings from a meter, the police would leave, we'd keep going. It's a public place being used in a way allowed by those that be. There's no bluetooth speaker today that can compare to our use of amplified sound.
We all have rights to be in public parks/trails/etc. Cities have ordinances about nuisance things like loud anything. If you're on a trail and someone comes along with a speaker you don't like, just let them pass. They aren't hurting anyone/thing, you're just annoyed. If you've plopped down in the park or at the beach when someone else comes along, you can talk to them about, but they again have rights to do it.
You are free to talk to your local representatives to change ordinances if that's how you feel. Good luck with that if that's what you so choose.
I think you're confusing the issue here. You were in a public place that explicitly allowed loud music with a permit. You obtained that permit, and you did what you were explicitly allowed to do. Great; you did the right thing.
But on hiking trails (and in many parks), there isn't that sort of thing. While some will prohibit loud noise, many don't say anything about loud noise. In those cases, in the absence of guidance, we should do the thing that is courteous and considerate of others: not play loud music.
Local parks are quite different from hiking trails.
A public park and a trail have very different meanings in my mind. When I say that I have encountered this on a trail, I'm specifically referring to trails in places which are designated wilderness areas, which are not subject to any ordinance. The US has a lot of national parks, national wilderness, and BLM land that is completely open to the public. That's a wonderful thing, but it also does not make sense to call for a park ranger to get involved in what is fundamentally a discontent at someone else's anti-social behavior, when I can simply have a conversation with them.
Behavior, and the response to behavior, exist on a spectrum. The fact you responded to me pointing out that "you do you" has philosophical limits, but that those limits should not involve criminalizing behavior, by suggesting I should campaign to enact an ordinance seems extremely obtuse. There is no need to change the law to criminalize making noise in a natural area, but similarly it's perfectly appropriate to tell someone to stop doing it.
> The US has a lot of national parks, national wilderness, and BLM land that is completely open to the public.
Many concerts, shooting ranges, and other loud activities occur in two of the three categories you mention above. All a lot louder than multiple hikers with Bluetooth speakers.
I won't even get into ATVs.
(Not disagreeing with your intent - merely pointing out to other readers of the various socially acceptable uses in these lands).
It's simple. You do you, but don't bother other people. That's all there is to it.
I might be in a minority saying this - and particularly so here on HN - but I struggle to understand why you'd be willing to use a tool like this, as OP did, but not to politely ask someone to keep it down?
My wife and I were sitting in the coffee shop/dining area of our grocery store not long ago, eating breakfast before we bought our groceries. There's a gentleman who's usually there on the same weekend days that we are, and he watches videos on his phone very loudly. It was clearly annoying everyone around, but this being Minnesota, nobody was going to bother him about it (instead they just do little glances over their shoulder or the "OPE" eyes at each other lol).
Finally, one older woman gets up and walks over to him. My wife and I are like "Oh shit, she's gonna let him have it, here it comes." She taps him on the shoulder and says "Excuse me, can you turn that down? It's very loud." And you know what he did? He said "Oh, sorry," and turned it down.
She said thanks and went back to her seat, simple as that.
Thanks for sharing your story about how simple normal requests lead to simple normal social outcomes.
The isolation and atomization of modern individualized living has led people to be so controlled by their anti-social anxieties, fear, and loathing of other people, that they and OP won't even try.
You've never met my neighbours! No seriously. Some people are just jerks.
That’s good, and I also have spoken to people in public about their noise several times, but…
That dude shouldn’t be turning it down; he should be turning it off.
My go-to line is: “Excuse me, do you have any earphones?”
I have seen fights break out in the subway over people being loud. People playing loud music in public often seem to be the types to be looking for trouble, they want someone to tell them to turn it down, so they can say no and escalate. In a lot of cities this is a big risk.
To this point, there have been at least a few stories of elderly people being beaten on San Francisco public transit for politely asking people to turn their music down.
OK, I read about someone being murdered by their spouse. That doesn't mean it is going to happen to me. The media reports on sensational stories. That doesn't make them normal.
You tend to know your spouse, you don't know the mental state of people on the train. Especially people who have already demonstrated they don't care about social norms or preserving tranquility in public spaces.
I remember one guy had a whole DJ setup on the subway once. Like he had a table, a laptop, several large speakers, a microphone, monitor headphones, the works. He would have been right at home DJing a kids birthday party.
The music he was playing was ridiculously bad. Obviously subjective but this was such terrible low effort stuff that I am not sure it would even make it to SoundCloud. Think “your stoner friend’s demo tape you try to listen to but can’t get more than three minutes in”
We were in a long tunnel and he turned the volume up, which I don’t think anyone wanted. I yell over the speaker and say he should that shit off. He said people here want it, to which I say “no they actually don’t. See how everyone here has headphones on? If your music was any good you wouldn’t have to force people to listen to it as hostages. If you want to actually test this then go to Washington Square Park, not the fucking train”.
He called me an asshole, turned the music even louder, and kept it going until I left the train. I don’t think he agreed with my reasoning.
This app is even more hostile.
The app is more hostile, I agree. Its a bad idea, and a good way to get beaten up.
Think of it as catering to the fantasy of a geek's revenge.
The keyword is fantasy.
> so i built a tiny app that plays back the same audio it hears, delayed by ~2 seconds. asked claude, it spat out a working version in one prompt. surprisingly WORKS.
Note, they never said they actually played it and then person realized they were being disrespectful and stopped. That whole scenario is supposed to happen in a hypothetic fantasy world, and every reader here is supposed to take in the same way for themselves.
But still, I think the solution is brilliant and I can't wait to try it.
If you ask someone to turn it down, it can immediately come off as confrontational, even if you're being polite. With this solution, though, it's kind of hilarious because in one sense it's more confrontational, but the original music blaster would have to ask you to turn it down - but it's just their music.
I'm a pretty nonconfrontational person, but the one time I lost it was when this late middle aged woman kept chatting away on her cell phone in the quiet car of the LIRR despite other people previously telling her that she was in the quiet car (I believe my exact words were "Hey princess, what part of 'no cellphones' do you not understand" - there is a giant sign at the front of the car that says no cellphone use). But I don't think I'd ever do this in a public situation where the rules weren't so clearly spelled out.
It's also incredibly passive aggressive and passive aggression is one of the most reliable ways to trigger defiance in someone.
At least it is for me. Especially when it's my moth... you know what? Never mind. If I keep going I'll spiral out.
Have you tried asking many people to "keep it down"? Generally that doesn't end with them politely keeping it down.
As with anything in life, it depends on how you ask.
You mean
"As with anything in life it depends on a huge number of variables such as location, number of allies the other person has, the threat potential you represent, the number of allies you have, your standing on the social ladder, if you're in a position of power, your ability to understand social clues, the exact method how you ask, yada yada"
No. It delends on how you ask.
Did you walk over? Did you say hi? Did you lower yourself to be around their height? Give them a second or two to get used to you? Tell them first that their noise is loud ? Ask them in a respectable tone if they would lower it, just a bit? Did you give the impression that you were asking, not demanding?
Of course I won't ask a drunk or aggressive looking person. But there is a wrong way to ask, and a better one.
I'm all for asking nicely in general but it doesn't work well with entitled people who don't give a shit about the people around them.
The chances, regardless how nice you try to ask, that the person who elected to broadcast their tiktoks or calls to the whole wagon at full volume goes "oh, sorry, I'm so embarrassed, I'll turn this off", are very low.
Last time I tried to ask "can you use headphones?", the guy answered "I don't have headphones" and put the volume even louder.
A person who cared even a tiny bit would not have started to begin with. Asking is almost futile. These people simply seem to be used to get away with inflicting themselves to people around without consequences. The worse part is that if you do nothing, you participate in this.
What can you do.
I think it can only work if it becomes very socially unbearable, or if they got fined for this. Or, indeed, if it brought them nuisance. In that regard, this HN post's solution is interesting (not sure it's good though).
i agree with this one, in this particular order, how things be in large cities & crowded areas:
- loud person does not care in the first place, that's why they do the loud act
- usually they are more than 1 person, outnumbering me
- although some places have public disturbance prohibited laws, unless there is a law enforcement/security around, chances of me being ending up in a hospital is higher than chances of stumbling on a decent person
- it is easier to act or play stupid
---
on a similar note, last time when i asked someone to lower their volume while having headphones on me, they demanded my headphones because they claimed they were too poor to buy one. -- i am talking about 20$ type-c earbuds vs 16" macbook size marshall speaker. -- as a result, i did not give my headphones and they continued to play music.
I'm not really sure where you're from or what sheltered life you've lived but this does not jive with reality what so ever.
Seems like you're from western Europe, and maybe people are nicer there, but once you get to a place with strong racism, classism, wealth disparity, you suddenly find that being civil has little weight.
> Of course I won't ask a drunk or aggressive looking person.
I've learned in my time in cities that it can be very hard to judge who is likely to be aggressive and who isn't.
No it doesn't. That's equivalent to saying you can get most woman to date you depending on how you ask.
> Did you walk over? Did you say hi? Did you lower yourself to be around their height? Give them a second or two to get used to you?
I personally detest the kind of people who behave like this. It all just exudes deliberate fakeness; if anyone were to try this on me I'll only be irritated more than anything else.
While I agree and I'm not the OP you're replying to this feels like the burden of societal correction needs to be on the wronged and not on the person committing it?
It's tolerating the intolerant (their intolerance to understanding social order). They need to be bludgeoned back (metaphorically).
in my experience, the more polite you are, the more likely you are to get punched in the face
If you are in a venue where politely asking someone to keep it down, results in them actually responding, you generally don't need to ask. You are among conscientious people to begin with.
For the most part, about 99% of the time, the whole point of drawing attention is waiting for someone to politely ask them to turn it down. And it isn't so they can respond in kind.
No. People who are loud do that because they want to be loud. They want to hurt people. And they get off to weaklings being polite. The law is too slow and too forgiving for these destructive forces. We need to bring violence back in a big way.
I left my Mac on top of my car in San Francisco once and the next day when I came back it was still there. The thing with catastrophic events that occur at 1% is that even if everyone were to risk it ten times (that's a huge amount for this I think) 9 out of every 10 people would say "nah, nothing happens, I've done it ten times without anything happening" but then 1 out of 10 would die.
So then the question becomes how well you've sampled that catastrophic risk before you say what the real risk is. As an example, I've been mask off and partying since as soon as that became legal. Haven't gotten sick from COVID yet. Shows, house parties, sharing drinks with people who later had it. Tested often because I was this high risk. Zero positives.
I could say "actually, if you just do the things that I did you'll be fine". After all, I've been fine. Nothing happened. I just didn't get sick. I've got the winning formula.
I was mask on and at a bar literally on the day they lifted the capacity restrictions, and came down with COVID days later. I was the lucky 1 in 10!
> I left my Mac on top of my car in San Francisco once and the next day when I came back it was still there.
Not the latest model, huh? That’s certainly a passive-aggressive way to suggest you upgrade…
In my experience, if you ask it politely and nicely, it works. I can't recall a time when it didn't.
I've seen a fistfight on the muni that started from this.
My experience has been that people are usually (>50% of the time) offended and non-compliant, no matter how politely you ask. Who am I to ask them to be quieter? They only stop if something annoying is happening for them, like this app, or audibly responding to their call/video.
Because social anxiety, typically. “What if the person tells me to fuck off? What if they make a scene of it?” Especially if six years ago you are the person who was in your teenage years, chances are your social skills are not what they could be if you didn’t spend a year in lockdowns.
Conversely, if you are the kind of person able to come up to a stranger and ask them (politely and respectfully!) to change what they are doing, you likely the person with the social skill to do other things well too.
I follow that, and it's something I've struggled with in the past, but doesn't this sort of solution make them more likely to tell you to fuck off or to make a scene, rather than less?
Imagine you are sitting in public watching TikTok videos and someone sitting two seats down from you just turns on this app. Are you more likely to say “hey sorry mate I didn’t realize it was bothering you.” or are you more likely to turn it up louder and/or tell them to fuck off?
Now imagine the same situation but the person comes up to you and says “excuse me but would you mind turning your volume down a bit or using headphones? The sound from your phone is really bugging me and I would really appreciate it.” Which situation is more likely to piss you off?
And sure you might respond poorly to both but I see no universe in which you respond positively to the first while I think there is a good chance you respond well to the second.
On the other hand if the person approaches you and says “hey buddy turn that shit down”.. but the kind of person to use this 2 second delay thing in my experience would never have the confidence to do something like that so not even worth considering.
It seems harder to justify telling someone to fuck off for doing literally the exact same thing you're currently doing.
What are they going to make a scene about? You playing audio loudly in a public space? They kind of ran out of legs to stand on a while ago.
> Because social anxiety, typically. “What if the person tells me to fuck off? What if they make a scene of it?”
As opposed to building a tool to actively annoy them without politely asking them a question? This doesn't follow.
I doubt the tool was actually used.
That’s my point. This tool is pointless because while it is designed to avoid confrontation it nearly guarantees it. A waste of bits, as it were.
What did you think "building social skills" meant? vibe coded apps?
Gotta start somewhere!
Just wait until Claude doesn’t want to be friends anymore and Alexa isn’t returning your calls. Siri will always talk to you but you don’t want to talk to her :)
It's not social anxiety. It's fear of being shot.
What a great society
I was at a Bills game in Buffalo last year. 5 rows ahead of me was big tall dude, who stood up and would not sit down. This was blocking the view of everybody behind him. People grumbled, but nobody said or did anything for about 20 minutes. I was quite peeved. Then an old lady right behind him gently tapped him on his shoulder and reminded him that he was blocking the view of several people behind him. The dude shrugged his shoulder and said, "not my problem, you can stand up too if you want". I am a mega-nerd, but I lost my cool right there and then and started screaming at the guy. My girlfriend, who didn't want to see me get beat up, pulled me away from the scene.
Many people are just massive assholes. Asking nicely does not work. Particularly big drunk dudes at an American football game. That was my first and last visit to a football stadium.
That really sucks, but don't deprive yourself of something you think you might enjoy because of that one jackass. Chances are that next time you won't experience something like that.
Also, basically every pro and semi-pro sports stadium nowadays has cell-phone-contactable security that you can summon to handle situations like these. The threat of being kicked out of his $250 seats is way more of a threat than that of being confronted by a "mega-nerd".
I wouldn't make a habit of contacting security over every little annoyance, but if they're obnoxiously blocking an old lady, that's the time to use it.
P.S.: your karma is currently 1337, sweet
Seek sympathetic allies and then contact relevant authorities is probably the best general piece of advice on dealing with any kind of conflict.
It is very difficult to stay polite while getting very angry. Politeness is usually reserved for respectful people. If somebody acts in a way that is perceived as intentionally disrespectful (whether that's actually the case or not), there is a severe psychological dissonance to overcome. Also physiologically people will get nervous, voice shaking, facial tension and twitching, heart racing, mind getting foggy when severely agitated which makes trying to act polite even more difficult. It's easier and seemingly more sensible to just skip straight to snapping or ... bottling the rage up to eventually release it against somebody sufficiently harmless - humans are monkeys after all (which isn't even necessarily bad, we should just strive for civilizing the chimp and strengthening the bonobo within us.)
I guess you’ve never experienced asking, and then having the person(s) act out from turning up the volume, aggression, following you on you hike or off the bus. All these things have happened around me or to me. I’ve stopped asking. It’s not worth the risk.
People doing these kinds of things don’t give a F about anyone else. They’re terrible “humans” and should be treated as such.
This feels like a case of imaginary revenge. I doubt the tool was actually used. Creating this tool was part of a revenge fantasy.
If someone has too much social anxiety or is too afraid to politely ask the other person to turn it down, using an actively annoying option like this isn't going to help. This is more likely to induce a confrontation.
Exactly! Every time I asked someone respectfully to lower their noise, it worked. Most times they apologized, I think sometimes people don't realize they're annoying others. It might be intimidating the first couple of times, but it's so much better to feel assertive and not be annoyed anymore.
Last time this happened was in a bar, there was a pianist playing, and a group sat right next to the piano and started being very noisy. I went and asked them to lower their voices. They apologized, and shut up entirely. Later, someone came to thank me for that.
On the other hand, I would never dare using that tool, it feels a bit childish and would make me feel like such an ass!
It's a great example of (effective, apparently) passive aggression, and, I would guess, is motivated by all the same reasons as any other kind of passive aggression. E.g., fear of open confrontation, or a desire to create a situation that is just as or more undesirable for them so that the other person actively chooses the thing you want, of their own free will.
It's a way to avoid direct confrontation via passive aggression.
Yeah except being passive aggressive actually tends to escalate the situation. Because sometimes people will just respond to a polite question, but now you've just been the same asshole to them, so there is a higher chance that they're just going to get offended.
The whole PA phenomenology originates from the military, where hierarchy prevents direct confrontation. So subordinates lash out in ways that are harder to counter. I feel like it's a similar dynamic here.
Absolutely, but the key word in the GP's use of "avoid direct confrontation" is direct. Being passive-aggressive is indirect, and even if it's more likely to cause an escalation, to many people it feels safer, even if it really isn't.
I mean, he took a picture of the guy posted it on his twitter calling him a 'fat uncle'. I don't think he cares about being polite.
You have to understand though that this is X (rip twitter) we are talking about and from the verified account, the 14k follower count, it is evident that this person either is or is trying to be a tech "influencer". Posting controversial rage-baits is pretty much the pattern every influencer follows today to stir up discussion, increase their visibility, and get more followers.
> I don't think he cares about being polite.
If you're polite, debate civilly, say reasonable things and act like a normal person, you are a nobody on X. Nobody will see your tweet. Nobody will engage with it. You might as well have not said anything.
Is "fat uncle" a slang I don't know about?
In some Asian cultures, "uncle" can be used to refer to any man older than yourself.
Is uncle just old unmarried guy?
Real courageous from that guy calling someone a "fat uncle" on a Twitter thread. Could've applied that same energy IRL and told him to tone it down.
lol this is a very good point
if you have the balls to do this next to someone, they will immediately recognize what you're doing right after they stop (if they stop).
that's gonna be 100x more awkward than asking them politely would have been.
Because then you don't end up with an idea for a coding project.
> didn't have the courage to speak up.
There's two options:
1. This is a lighthearted joke that someone made after having a bad experience with others being noisy in public. (Most likely scenario.)
2. The author is going to actually use this tool in public, in which case they are either a power-tripping asshole who gets off on "outsmarting" people, or a limp-wristed coward without basic social skills.
This. People are scared of human interactions more and more. It's all about being passive agressive or avoiding the good ol' conformism through connection.
On the other hand if you can force people to behave through machine processes it's much more effective than human processes
i would hope you're not the minority. i'm in your camp.
Agreed. Especially since something like this seems much more likely to get the other person to turn on you. It’s passive aggressive.
Seriously, this is as easy as tapping the dude next door and telling him to tone that volume down.
Negative social skills on that Twitter thread
What's old is new again!
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/japanese-researchers-make-speec...
> In general, human speech is jammed by giving back to the speakers their own utterances at a delay of a few hundred milliseconds
That’s what I seemed to remember also.
I think 2 seconds like in the OP link is too long delay to work as actual jamming.
version 2.0 - why not both? one for noise-cancelling, one for social-cancelling.
Years ago, I wanted to build this exact concept into a smartphone so I could just toggle it on whenever I needed to end an interminably long phone conversation.
It’s basically the “Chinese food” Seinfeld gag.
Similar, but OP is about making people socially conscious of the noise they're producing (not through speech), while this "jamming" technique actually (at least theoretically) interferes with the cognitive process of choosing and forming words.
I carry cheap earbuds I got off aliexpress in my backpack and offer them to people who are listening to music or tiktok without headphones.
I have a nonzero accept rate!
But you really have to be in the right frame of mind. If you approach someone in anger, they'll pick up on it and mirror you.
The best line I've found so far is, "I know Apple stopped giving out earbuds with their phones; would you like some?"
I appreciate your empathy for the fellow human. Even if it's "undeserved" it still makes things better for everyone involved.
Very funny!
I believe the concept of public decency is entirely cultural and has less to do with courage.
Where I live, if someone is being loud in public, you usually keep to yourself. So long as they are not being overtly offensive or profane.
In other countries, like the Netherlands for example, people will have no problem telling you to be quiet or verbalize any violation of cultural norms. I believe it's like that in Germany and Scanda as well, from what I hear.
My go-to for situations like these: Assume that the offender _clearly_ didn't mean to behave incorrectly, and help them overcome the mistake.
Person in a public space listening to reels at full volume? Get their attention, then loudly point out that their headphones got disconnected and everybody can hear the audio.
People leaving a train or bus and leaving behind trash? Loudly let them know that they forgot their water bottle or paper bag. If it's a single item, this works doubly well if you helpfully hand them the item, too.
Here's one I don't know how to solve: at work some folks take meetings in the bathroom. They're on their phone, they walk to a stall, do their... business while doing their business, all the while talking and listening, while toilets flush in the background.
I understand cultural differences but taking business meetings in the bathroom seems inappropriate under effectively all circumstances.
Robert Caro, in the LBJ series, wrote about how LBJ would use the discomfort of being the bathroom as a negotiating technique and a show of dominance. He would drag senators into the bathroom and force them to listen to him talk as he used the urinal, or force his staffers to take dictation as he took a shit.
Also, LBJ allegedly unzipped his fly and exposed himself to reporters demanding to know why the U.S. was in Vietnam, declaring, "This is why!".
his limp biscuit is why the US was in Vietnam? Was Vietnam hording the viagra? The US sure has a history of psychopathic presidents.
It seems he was well-endowed
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/50ej3a/how_d...
"limp biscuit" is an activity, not a euphemism for a penis.
Crazily enough, I’ve also heard he pulled his Johnson out in meetings.
I'd like to say that is where the slang originates, but perhaps it just gave him extra license.
There is a joke here somewhere.
Toobin would like a word.
Toobin had many words. Most of them were onomatopoeias.
And called it Jumbo
I have seen more than one CEOs of big companies do this. The number VPs is probably a lot more.
The TV show Veep is great. She behaves like this sort of arsehole, with utterly crass behaviour, and coming from a female makes it more striking.
Amazing show.
Thanks for the tip, looks interesting
Apparently he urinated on the shoes of a secret service agent just as a flex.
We now know why he served only one term:)
Why? It sounds like he was a number two term president.
It was somewhat of a joke;) He completed Kennedy's term and and was only only elected once. He refused to run for a 3rd. Given the immense ego's of these guys one might assume it was because he was unlikely to win. Peeing on people is unlikely to win you a lot of friends.
Well, one and a half.
These days, stunts like that might get you a third term.
Try this on me. It won't work.
A previous CTO at my company would do this and it always weirded me out. Standing at the urinal, and suddenly hear him talking to a customer over in the stall. Very strange and uncomfortable.
I won't lie, though, I secretly enjoyed timing flushes to match when he was talking.
> timing flushes
Or porcelain-shattering dumps. Such a liberating experience by itself in a public bathroom, doing it to someone on the phone would give me a memory that would bring a smile to my lips for many years.
I understand the overwhelming opposition to this, and I wouldn't do it myself. However, I lead a life of very few meetings (I'd actually appreciate more--this stance puts me in a very small company, to be sure), so it's easy for me to say that one should be more judicious with one's timing.
I can emphathise with someone stuck in meetings all day in a predominantly listening role, that they consider perfunctory or mostly pointless, or maybe in a very active role that has them stressfully bouncing from meeting to meeting.
I can easily envision how this would lead to a kind of nihilistic resignation and a determination to just do normal life stuff with a headset on one's head.
There’s a difference between passively listening to a meeting and actively participating, while being in the bathroom.
I would never do either. But one is less weird than the other.
And if you're going to be playing audio in the bathroom, any audio, wear some god damn headphones. I don't want to listen to your standup or your tiktok.
Exactly. If you’re just listening on a headset and are muted, then it’s way less obnoxious.
> However, I lead a life of very few meetings
An old business partner had meetings which felt like 24/7. He had zero issue taking a phone call in the bathroom. I doubt anyone on the other end ever knew.
But my 1 pair of Bluetooth headphones are dead and who could possibly sleep at night if their phone was 1mm thicker for a headphone jack???
He was a speakerphone or hold it to his ear person lol. Only used headphones if he was listening to music.
As a matter of fact, I do NOT understand the overwhelming opposition to this. What's your deal if a guy is good at multitasking and people on the other end of the wire don't mind it? It isn't like he is desecrating a temple, or intruding into your home and using your toilet, or jerking off in the public... Wait, actually I'd say even the latter shouldn't be your business, unless he stains something. Why cannot people mind their own business?
> It isn't like he is desecrating a temple, or intruding into your home and using your toilet, or jerking off in the public...
Just like jerking off, defecation should be done in private. Meetings are not private. Very few people want to see/hear/smell you do that and that includes over zoom or phone conference. Most people really do want to mind their own business, and that means having no part in you doing those very private things.
If someone is in a meeting on their phone while in a bathroom stall it's also very rude to everyone else in the bathroom trying to do their own business as privately as they possibly can under the circumstances.
I do not wish to hear anyone else's bathroom noises. Yes, we all use the bathroom. No, I still don't want to hear anyone else doing it.
Even that I'd call somewhat petty, but it is more defensible if it's insulting to you when you hear toilet noises from your phone, and you are totally in your right to tell it straight to the person who is calling you, that it's hard to hear him behind all farts and flushes. That's ok. People here seem to be complaining that somebody else is talking to somebody else on a phone while being in the public (office) toilet. I mean, I kinda understand if it distracts them from their business due to some psychological difficulties they may have, but that's the public toilet design fault when you cannot feel isolated enough, not the guy's talking.
Me either, which is why I find it so satisfying to shake the stall with explosive bowel movements when necessary. I’m very private by nature so it makes me giddy to cut loose. Only when necessary of course.
I take noise cancelling headphones to the bathroom at work, especially after lunch.
Talk about a spoiled 1st world problem
What a weird take. If I'm also in the bathroom, I can tune out all the other noises around me because everyone's in there to do the same thing. If I were on the phone with someone, paying close attention to what they're saying, and then I'm treated to a thunderstorm of bowl challenges, I'm going to be annoyed.
Humans pee, fart, and burp. That's perfectly normal. And yet, it's considered basic politeness not to do those things in a freaking business meeting if you can help it.
At the end of the day it's very easy and free to not shit while on a conference call. I think 99% of people would prefer a shit-free conference call, so, maybe we're all spoiled.
> What's your deal if a guy is good at multitasking and people on the other end of the wire don't mind it?
I strongly suspect these sorts of people don't ask the people on the other end of the line for their consent.
(TBH, I would probably give that consent if asked, though I'd never take a meeting from the toilet myself.)
It’s either a weird power flex, or someone who lacks agency at the point that they let themselves be bullied and not taking a break to take a dump.
It’s the breaking of a norm that makes me be question your judgment, either way.
Is this a sarcastic take?
Asking because I was pretty much on-board with the comment and took it as being fully serious, up until the point of “jerking off in public shouldn’t be anybody else’s business, unless they stain something” being mentioned.
Now, I am not so sure. Either the entire comment was sarcastic or I am missing something major. But putting jerking off in public and talking on the phone in a public bathroom into the same bucket of activities (in terms of appropriateness) feels crazy to me.
They are not in the same bucket, and I'm being intentionally provocative, if this confession makes things easier for you, but I really don't think you should mind that much if somebody is jerking off in public unless it harms you in some way (in broad sense, e.g. being intentionally annoying, loud and doing it right into your face). The point is that you should do whatever you want unless it harms others, and shouldn't mind other people doing whatever they want unless it actually harms you. I would say a guy watching tiktok without a headset right next to you in the airport harms you waaay more than a guy jerking off in the same airport standing 10 m away from you or anyone else. I mean, it's disconcerning, because you'd rightfully assume he must be crazy, but the activity itself really shouldn't bother you.
And surely anyone mentioned is a hundred times less harmful than a guy smoking on the street. That should be illegal. Yet people for some reason act as if it's ok, and it is broadly legal in most places (unlike jerking off in public).
Are you talking about jerking off in a stall, or on a park bench with your dick out? Or some third option in the middle somewhere?
Not to mention, it’s a crime which may get you on a register. And I don’t have a problem with it being classified as a crime.
This is like some 4chan post.
I assumed they meant jerking off in a stall. Something I don’t want to know about but definitely happens.
I have no wish to listen to other people's bodily functions when I'm working, or conversely to listen to them working while I'm answering a call of nature. The correct response to these behavior is to either hang up on them or tell them to shut the fuck up, respectively. It's not OK to impose yourself on others like this.
Taking a meeting in the bathroom is desecrating the temple.
Thank you for helping me clarify something. Your last example, jerking off in public, is not only a crime (as it should be) but is clearly antisocial behavior. That helped me realize that's what all the other shit is too, no pun intended. Using the restroom while you're talking to other people on the phone, or generally just doing anything that forces other people to listen to you use the restroom, is antisocial behavior and shouldn't be tolerated by anyone civilized.
"Minding your own business" when it comes to antisocial behavior is enabling when the correct response in shaming and ostracizing. It's not going to work with LBJ but it will probably work with Kevin from accounting.
Was this supposed to be on an alt account?
> Here's one I don't know how to solve: at work some folks take meetings in the bathroom.
Not legal but there’s a technical solution that’s worked in the past: pocket cell jammer. Range isn’t very far but it’ll work to boot callers a stall away or a booth away at a diner, etc. Only need to run it a few seconds to drop a call.
Do want to stress these do see enforcement now (in the US at least) but a low power pocket one used occasionally is unlikely to attract attention. It will be noticed if it’s higher power or runs in a regular location. Fines are severe and risk jailtime but hey it’s your life.
Question: if two people are caught having SDR units that could cause the jamming, how do they know who is guilty?
Both. It's not who caused the jam. Operating these things isn't legal to begin with.
Actually, just being in possession of such a device in the US isn't legal. Whole FCC page on it with citations: https://www.fcc.gov/general/jammer-enforcement
This is probably an area where SDR's with send capability could in theory be prosecuted as a jamming device. Whether it's been interpreted that way or enforced ever is unknown to me. A purpose built device advertised as a jammer would absolutely be a problem.
Oh also, the 1934 communications act is supposed to prohibit US/state governments from using such devices as well, but they've ignored the law. Some companies in the 2000's challenged it for use in their buildings and afaik lost the cases. My experience dates from that same time range when they were sort of accepted as de jure illegal but there wasn't de facto enforcement.... also networks use more bands now so a jammer covering more frequency ranges would be needed. back then they could do 3 ranges (850mhz-ish, 1900mhz-ish, 2100mhz-ish), now there would be way more like 3.7ghz down to 600mhz. Ignoring mmwave, that's not going to be in your bathroom.
> Actually, just being in possession of such a device in the US isn't legal.
Wait, SDR devices are not legal in the US? That doesn't sound plausible.
My "computerized legal advisor" says:
> There’s no rule from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) that forbids individuals or hobbyists from buying, importing, or owning SDR hardware in the United States. You can legally purchase and have them.
> Radios that transmit need FCC equipment authorization (such as certification or Supplier’s Declaration of Conformity) before they can be marketed in the U.S. if they are capable of operating in ways that could cause interference. That’s primarily a manufacturer obligation, not something that restricts private ownership.
> Owning a device is fine, but you must not transmit illegally. Sending signals on unauthorized frequencies or at unauthorized power levels can lead to fines, equipment seizure, and other penalties.
As with so many other things, intent matters.
Owning lockpicks? Fine!
Owning lockpicks when you're caught burgling a house? You're extra screwed.
Owning an SDR? Fine!
Owning an SDR and getting caught using it to illegally disrupt communications? You're extra screwed.
Yes, you can absolutely own an SDR, and transmit with it on legal frequencies. If you're busted using it to break the law, then it's strong evidence that you went out of your way to deliberately, premeditatedly break it, and that makes for a bad day.
The person upthread said, unqualified:
> Actually, just being in possession of such a device in the US isn't legal.
Their view was that it isn't legal to own, regardless of context or intent. That's what GP was arguing against.
Yeah. I was reassuring the parent of my post that they’re right, it’s legal to own an SDR. You can still get in extra trouble for breaking the law with it, but it’s perfect fine to have and use one otherwise.
Sure, but my original question was what happens if two people are caught with an SDR unit, and authorities can't prove who (of the two people) used their unit to do the jamming.
Not a lawyer. My guess: if they’re together, they’d both be charged, as if they robbed a store as a team. If they’re not, neither would be charged, as each would have a brilliant defense.
Nobody clicks the link and reads… they just use the slop generators, now I’m stuck having to do tard wrangling:
> Sections 510 - allows for seizure of unlawful equipment (47 U.S.C. § 510).
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/47/510
> (a) Violation with willful and knowing intent Any electronic, electromagnetic, radio frequency, or similar device, or component thereof, used, sent, carried, manufactured, assembled, possessed, offered for sale, sold, or advertised with willful and knowing intent to violate section 301 or 302a of this title, or rules prescribed by the Commission under such sections, may be seized and forfeited to the United States.
Guess what? You don’t have to be a fucking lawyer to know how to read.
So much confident incorrectness. It says you can’t do those things with a device that’s marketed as being a jammer. Any radio can be used as a jammer, just not sold for that specific purpose.
So yes, you can own an SDR, slop and/or reading comprehension notwithstanding.
I wonder if there’s a jammer out there that also sends WiFi deauth packets
Plenty, this is something off the shelf consumer hardware can be modified to do.
However it's not super effective anymore as 802.11w (protected management frames) is a thing and mandatory for WPA3: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEEE_802.11w-2009
Ah I’m a few years out of date but I’ll admit I don’t see many WPA3 APs in homes
My previous employer was a twenty-something person shop and the owner would do this while speaking with clients. Granted, it was a single-person bathroom, but it still drove me mad. There’s no way people couldn’t hear what was happening while he spoke and flushed the toilet. Maybe that’s part of why we weren’t getting new clients.
this is, and forgive me the lowering of quality discourse here, what ripping one’s loudest farts and triple flushing is for. if they are so important that they can live through the embarrassment that i would assume 99.9% of people would feel in that situation, then good on ‘em.
Being unable to feel embarrassment is not a "good on 'em" situation. The inability to feel shame is a serious impairment of one's faculties. It is literal brain damage.
> I understand cultural differences
These are not cultural differences. This behavior is across-all-cultures lack of decency.
I would say the answer is education, but like the law doesn't even prevent all speeding, maybe the answer is speed bumps (this app?)
Just join in the conversation. People hate that for some reason.
Tangentially, I did this once years ago.
I had consumed a large amount of spicy food the day prior, and it pulled the fire alarm right in the middle of a phone screen. I foolishly thought I could silently and secretly handle both tasks at once.
These were the days before background noise filters. The poor candidate obviously heard unpleasant things but neither of us acknowledged it directly.
He accepted the job though. But this still bothers me decades later. Never again!
Have you thought it could be because of the pressure they're getting at work? Today you're forced to work when you're sick, to do your business while doing your business...
I agree that flushing toilets could have been muted, but isn't it a Zoom/Google-Meets issue when they're supposed to remove the noise?
Crushing it! And flushing it.
During toilet and all other breaks between my patients' visits I always call back the numbers had reached me. During the flush moment I increase my voice volume. I don't know how it's heard on the other side. There is no other way I return home on time.
Go to the stall next door, play pooping and farting noises on your phone, very loudly.
I really don't need a phone to do that. That's what I'm in there for already.
Oh, I had that in my old office building, everyone but me was buying and selling fruit and they were dealing while shitting in the communal bathrooms. Really weird when you just want to defecate and suddenly someone yells into their phone YES I'LL BUY EVERYTHING.
I worked in a building that shared the floor with a small law office, the number of lawyers that would cruise on in to take a piss while chatting away on their Bluetooth earphones was too high. They would be talking about their client's cases too, no respect for privacy at all.
Once you took a meeting while taking a shit, you will see things differently. It just makes problems look insignificant, when you're pumping one out while you listen to someone explain how the issue is company critical.
Of course, disable your camera and mute your mic while dropping or flushing.
And how to deal with it becomes vastly different when you've done it. It's just human. Just ignore it.
In 1-on-1 it would be awkward to call it out but in a group meeting where I wouldn't be singling a person out it'd be pretty easy to just ask "could whoever's in the bathroom please mute?" without any kind of confrontation.
Agree that this is very annoying and I can’t imagine taking calls much less having discussions while on the toilet.
Let me guess: Ireland?
This ... is disgusting and appalling.
Report it to HR
If the Supreme Court can do it then why not Jan in backend dev?
https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/06/politics/toilet-flush-supreme...
Under what punishable figure, pissing while working?
HR is not merely about punitive measures.
This would be escalated to upper management to find out why people are under so much time pressure that they need to take calls in the bathroom, and at the very least doing so would be made some kind of violation of new policy.
These are the kinds of reports the organization needs as ammunition in order to fix what sound like bigger problems with the organization and work culture. There's very little chance this hasn't been noticed and isn't a symptom of something more going on.
> This would be escalated to upper management to find out why people are under so much time pressure that they need to take calls in the bathroom, and at the very least doing so would be made some kind of violation of new policy.
Or why there are people so idle that they can defecate without working.
Remember, HR protects the company, and complaints about heavy hitters because they work on porcelain aren't going to reflect well on the complainant.
Yes, that old chestnut. It's such insanely toxic advice too.
You're correct that HR is there to protect the company. The original post did not specify "heavy hitters", nor did I ever say to make an accusatory report. HR doesn't have to specifically know who is taking their calls this way.
I'm sorry if you or others have had such bad experiences with the most basic of HR interactions, though if I assume you're taking your own advice I doubt you've ever tried.
There's the tactful way to do this, and then there's whining to HR. I would be very careful taking advice from whiners because they're the ones who keep propagating this bad faith myth about HR.
All I'm saying to do is notify them about ongoing behavior with an emphasis on how it probably makes the company look bad and that it's done by many. They don't care who is doing it and it's not personal. I'd honestly be very surprised if this behavior doesn't already fall under some existing policy.
> I'm sorry if you or others have had such bad experiences with the most basic of HR interactions, though if I assume you're taking your own advice I doubt you've ever tried
I use HR to protect my company from people like you.
And there it is.
It's exactly as I suspected. The only people spreading the toxic advice about HR are the ones who benefit most from making the workplace suck for everyone else.
I can only hope you just think HR is there to insulate you this way and haven't had to test it, because it simply isn't. You really don't want to be on the losing end of a wrongful termination suit. It's only because people rarely bother that you may not have come across one of those. Then it then escalates to worse when all of HR spills their guts about the pressure they were under to protect higher ups.
There is no loyalty after all. It's just a job to everyone else.
HR insulates me and the rest of the heavy hitters from people like you. It's a Godsend, obviously.
Surveilling co-workers in the bathroom is more than sufficient grounds for dismissal - gross misconduct.
It's obviously not surveillance, and if it's as common as OP made it seem everyone already knows.
HR isn't that dumb and doesn't need to find another squealer.
> but taking business meetings in the bathroom seems inappropriate under effectively all circumstances.
Now, now ... if she is pretty ...
I regularly engage in meetings when taking a dump, but only when I'm working from home, and of course flushing only on mute. I don't have a problem with that, the other side has no idea where I am anyway.
Everyone knows you're in a toilet due to the acoustics, but no-one is going to bring it up out of courtesy. Everyone also thinks less of you for it.
I highly doubt it. Most people are in rooms with bad acoustics to begin with.
I'm not sure if you're serious, but everyone knows.
No one knows.
We know now
Why don't you just excuse yourself for a few minutes like any normal human being would?
Yeah this whole thread is absolutely filled with prudes as far as I'm concerned. Everybody poops, get over it.
I think you're mistaken sir.
I myself, me... Am descendant from a long line of arms that ascend from misty lakes depensing royalty on the form of moist scimitars.
One of my favorite web apps for testing your microphone and camera has this echo feature built in, with 0s, 1s and 3s delay:
Indian-American here. Thank you for this!
I have hearing sensitivity and have repeatedly asked my parents to lower the volume on TVs, whatsapp videos, insta reels 100s of times. They always lower it for 5 minutes before raising it back. Likely because they are losing their hearing, but unable to admit that.
I tend to be very mindful of others (maybe because I grew up in America), but my parents are not even mindful of my requests. Maybe it's a cultural thing? I expect those who have grown-up (or spent their whole lives) in India would do the same.
Definitely need to test this out app out when I go home.
Two words
Flipper Zero
On the flip side, people with hearing sensitivity are the most god awful people to deal with. It’s like the entire world has to quiet down for them when they could just as easily put in ear plugs instead.
Hyperacusis is a real thing. One of my kidults has it, and yes, they use active noise cancelling ear plugs or over the ear headphones and sometimes the world is still too loud.
The idea that 12 lines of vibe coded JavaScript prompted because someone was too scared to talk to someone disturbing him (but not enough to take a creep shot and blast him on Twitter) could make it to the top post of this website is quite sad.
i've seen people get beat up because they asked an anti-social c-words to turn the volume down.
some people just cannot be reasoned and the amount of people like this is growing HARD.
I’ve never really understood that. I’ve never been beat up over it but people have gotten extremely defensive over it.
Is it some kind of minor evangelism on their end? Like they think the music is so wonderful that obviously everyone should be listening to it?
I don't know what makes you think passively aggressively playing the sound back at a person like that would illicit any better a response.
Too much engagement arguing if you should be able to hike and listen to music.
I'm pretty amused this is what the post has deveolved into. If this was a Trump thread it would have been [Flagged] by now.
Did you forget what site you were on? This is Hacker News.
And twitter was just a static page you could post 140 character messages to.
> me being me, didn't have the courage to speak up
I hardly imagine a situation where speaking up is less "couraging" than using such tool to mock annoying person.
I think the word you're looking for is courageous.
I imagine they keep their headphones on or play it off as the device doing it on it's own. The "work" of having to solve the problem hasn't gone away, but it has been translated from social into lying by omission and performative contradiction.
EDIT: By performative contradiction I mean doing the thing the person is doing to demonstrate the contradiction.
Speaking up would have a higher failure rate. Speaking up overtly stimulates the annoying person's defensiveness and propensity to challenge back. Subtle manipulation always works better.
Be assertive and transparent and then use the app. Otherwise you are just being passive aggressive.
In the 80's we had a way to deal with that kind of thing [1]. Just gotta practice to get the technique right.
I had this exact scene in my mind and I am glad I am not alone, friend
Exactly! Also, that random ride across the bridge towards Marin is taking forever
At my old job I had a phone that had IR remote capability. I'd turn off or mute the blaring TVs in our break rooms. Good times.
There used to be a commercially-made tv-b-gone device. Not sure if it's made anymore, but there's a DIY kit that appears to do the same thing: https://www.adafruit.com/product/73
I used to carry one with me everywhere (it was small enough to fit on a keychain). One night at a sports bar, I showed it to a friend. Before I could stop him, he pushed the button and every TV in the place went black, right in the middle of some PPV sports event. Anyway, he bought one on the spot.
When iPhones still had the headphone port, a friend of mine soldered a IR led on top of a minijack, something like this:
https://www.rtfms.com/wp-content/rtfms-com/LED-pinout.png
Then, with some special app, or even just playing some audiofiles — I don't remember — he'd do the same thing as the device above.
Wow, this is clever. Yeah, the headphone out can push out a signal like 1 volt at low current, but this is likely enough for the IR LED to "light up". I really like this idea.
The original TV-B-Gone [0][1] was designed by the legendary Mitch Altman [2].
There was a guy who sold a chip for that which you fitted to a car keyfob. In the olden days of the late 80s, Valeo used a pretty insecure not-rolling-code infrared thing for central locking systems.
Anyway you'd get a handful of old Rover, Peugeot, Renault, or Citroën (and a bunch of others) fobs from the scrapyard and fit this pre-programmed PIC microcontroller, and when you pressed the button it would cycle through a bunch of volume down, mute, and power off commands for most common brands of TV.
However the real genius one - and it was about 20 quid - was this. Remember Furbies? They would chatter away to each other, using infrared to communicate so they'd go in sync. Well, this one that transmitted the "GO TO SLEEP RIGHT NOW" command to any Furby in the room. Relatively expensive but worth it.
The Woz would be so proud
> There used to be a commercially-made tv-b-gone device.
Not sure about that one either but its functionality has been cloned for the Flipper Zero [1]
There’s a TV-BE-GONE app for Bruce on the CardPuter and I think one for the Flipper Zero as wells. It will cycle through dozens of codes to power off the TV. It’s been fun to turn off random TVs, though I don’t do it much because I don’t want to be too much of a douche.
Okay, but... people with loud phones/voices in public places are absolutely fine with it because they don't care about anybody else's space or opinion of them. And they very likely are not afraid of instigating confrontation or assault either.
In my experience 99% of people will turn down the volume or use headphones if you ask nicely.
I never in my life was confronted or even assaulted, even by noisy teenagers or grim looking men.
Not saying it’s impossible but I would guess it’s very unlikely. Ymmv
It 100% depends where you're at and the culture of that place, along with your perceived threat level.
People that are perceived as no threat or a 100% chance of being a deadly threat if ignored typically have no problems here. It's the grey zone where conflict shows up. Think of a little 60 year old grandma asking nicely the vast majority of people will listen. Same if you're a 6'7" slab of rock with tear drops tattooed on your face. Meanwhile if you're a minority asking a racist to turn down the volume, this situation is going to cause conflict almost all of the time.
He's not completely wrong though. I was assaulted (pushed and fell to the ground) for asking someone to turn down their music at a pool. And I think I've asked less than 20 people in my life to turn down their music.
99% is way too high. More like 30 or 40%.
``` README.md
straight up honest - originally called this "make-it-stop" but then saw @TimDarcet also built similar and named it STFU. wayyyyy better name. so stole it. sorry not sorry.
```
Probably the reason that the code "worked" from a single prompt. Could potentially have downloaded the github repo first...
> Probably the reason that the code "worked" from a single prompt
I took a look at the repo, and the whole thing is 12 lines of JS and some basic HTML and CSS. I'm not surprised at all it worked the first time from a single prompt. No need to copy someone else's project for something so simple.
Good that you did.
At least the author clearly delinated that it is indeed sloppiest of slop.
adding levels of indirection/abstraction is a common engineering move, especially in software engineering.
I moved from a very quiet culture to a very noisy one.
Here people watch tik tok on full blast, people let their kids run amok in concrete cafes, constantly honk at each other, blast karaoke for all neighbors to hear, etc.
These people have some ability to sift through noise. For example being able to talk to someone on the phone with a loudspeaker in a loud environment while both seem to understand each other well.
But for some reason, the majority of people don't care, and so in some weird way, the concept of sound pollution don't exist.
When sound pollution don't exist as a concept, there is nothing to get annoyed about.
I love that you're honest about having one-shot something with Claude and that you describe the experience in your own words without asking Claude to hype up the result for you.
It's also a simple, genius idea. Congrats.
[Edit: I guess this wasn't submitted by the author/prompter. Still, you get the point.]
I'm all for building apps to solve problems, but I would really encourage folks to ask people politely to do what you want them to do, rather than having an app do it for you.
You can just ask people for things! And you will become a better person for it.
Asking people publicly tends to challenge their ego and bring up defensiveness. It would fail a lot more than subtle manipulation like this, and instead bring additional confrontation.
Hilarious. When working on a virtual reality VOIP product, someone added a test mode that played back your own speech with a delay. It was like part of your brain shut off, was a surprisingly strong effect.
I'm old enough to remember when cell phones were primarily used for voice calls. Sometimes you'd hear yourself when you were trying to talk to someone, and it was infuriating. You'd have to hang up and call back, if the call was going to go on any length of time.
I've had this happen on modern video calls at work a few times as well, same solution too.
People blasting awful music any time of the day or night, anywhere (neighbours, beachgoers, public park, transit) is enough of a problem in my country (Brazil) that arduino/Raspberry Pi/ESP32-based bluetooth jammers are somewhat common.
I would never try to use it though, as you can very realistically get killed in retaliation.
How could you get in trouble (aside of this probably being illegal, at least I know it is in my country)? How would people know that you are jamming the signal, and not someone else?
Non-asshole-seeming people tend to be, unbeknownst to themselves, conspicuous in these scenarios
Unfortunately this is the most dangerous when it is most needed - on the New York City subway, especially when the train has a cell signal, when jackasses listen to reels of IG and TikTok and scroll at high volume.
It's an incredibly rude world we live in - this behavior two decades ago would have led to a fight. Now everyone is scared to tell anyone anything, since punching or stabbing are risks. Also, I believe the new generation is hyper tolerant of such things compared to us olds.
This is a weird comment but, I read this before bed. In my dream, I was on a subway or at an airport or some travel place and I did this and the dude in my dream got mad and chased me. :D
Even subconsciously, I seem to love this app.
I saw a video a few years ago with people speaking into microphones connected to a digital delay attached to headphones they wore. With something like a 200 - 300ms delay most people could only speak a few words before becoming unable to speak intelligibly.
Something like that, with a directional microphone and one of those eerie directional speaker rigs I find in retail stores could be tons of fun for those irritating people who insist on using speaker phone in public.
It seems that most of the people who suffer from loud voices in public spaces tend not to confront those scoundrels, and instead eat it up and wonder endlessly how they can be so mindless and rude to others. I am sometimes like that as well, but I would rather "fix" it myself because I just don't know of any practical ways to bring about a proper public commute etiquette. That's not my job.
Today I went to Munich on public transportation — with a mix of transfers on trams and regional trains. I think I read about 50 pages, all the while traveling. It may sound like an ad, but it's not; I really appreciate my Sony XM4 — would not have been possible to focus on reading without it — which I've been using for years now. I put it on with ANC, and play a non-distracting focus music. This helps quite a lot!
Oh, some of us do confront them.
You're lucky to be able to read on public transport. I barely can anymore because of these people.
Reminds me of SpeechJammer:
https://sites.google.com/site/qurihara/top-english/speechjam...
(which won the Ig Nobel prize in 2012)
I like it but what this program needs is some DSP: an overdrive, reverb, delay, flanger, chorus and what not :D
https://htmlpreview.github.io/?https://github.com/Pankajtanw...
It's working. Op might consider adding to readme
I wish there was an app for the other annoyances of the 'Bombay' airport. Like the get your ass in line app, or I don't need you to carry my luggage 5ft and demand a tip app.
That reminds of seeing Mike Rowe do something like this that just broke my brain of doing exactly that for extended periods of time for voice over work.
Very similar in theory to Bob Widlar's legendary "hassler" circuit
I'm a musician, and any delay between the sound coming direct from my instrument and from my headphones completely bollixes my ability to play.This made online jam sessions with an acoustic instrument impossible.
> app that plays back the same audio it hears, delayed by ~2 seconds.
> idk i'm not a neuroscientist. all i know is it makes people shut up and that's good enough for me.
Is it happening for the right reasons?
What is going through the minds of those people in that moment, when they hear an audio recording of what just happened played back to them?
Are they thinking they're being recorded? Are they nervous? Do they feel threatened? Might they act out on this in an unexpected and perhaps escalating way?
These are why I would not use this app.
There was an exhibit at the Exploratorium demonstrating a similar effect. You speak into a device and it plays your voice back to you delayed. If you're also listening for the other person this makes it impossible to speak. You can easily ignore it by just not paying attention to the audio back but it's surprising how, if you have to listen, this delay ruins everything. Someone saying a different thing, on the other hand, is easy to listen to while speaking.
I love this… have been thinking about exactly this technology for years but combined with phased array directional loudspeaker and shotgun mic. Deploy during major political speech, instantly shut down brain of speaker, would appear to be an internal malfunction
The fact that we can't just spin up a Claude code on our iPhones and have it program and run the end result right there in iOS should be chargeable offense by apple (and Android). Looking forward to the day that this capability exists.
Since this is a web app, you kind of can do it today using web tools, but I know what you mean.
It is true that this app is more hostile than asking someone to keep it down, but people should beware of either approach, as it's not unusual for the same assholes who are comfortable blasting their audio in public spaces to also be comfortable getting into a fist fight.
I have personally been threatened on multiple occasions because I asked someone to turn down (or turn off) their volume while watching videos on their phone in public.
In one instance, I was in a doctor's office waiting room and a rather large, otherwise normal-looking man (likely in his late fifties) was watching videos at full volume while 4-5 of us were sitting quietly. We were all annoyed by him and exchanging looks, so I politely asked him to mute the video or watch it outside and he stood up and started threatening to fight me in a doctor's office waiting room!
In my anecdotal experience in various tier 2 USA cities (i.e., not NY, SF, LA, etc), Gen-Xers and Boomers seem to be the worst offenders and also surprisingly, the most belligerent when confronted.
If you're going to try either approach (this app, or asking), please do not be surprised if you find yourself in a rapidly escalating confrontation that may quickly result in physical violence.
Sometimes, this calculus is more than worth it, sometimes it's not, but just don't think it can't happen.
My 3 and 5 year old love this, very entertaining for small children.
And I’ll most definitely use this for its intended use, great way to solve that problem. Nice job
Sorely needed app. Amazing how inconsiderate and shameless many people are these days: airport, bus, train, even the gym sauna just blasting random tiktok feeds.
On the one hand I love this. Otoh. Will the people who this is supposed to target actually care?
To be fair, the callousnes of the people blastimg any audio in public is just beyond me.
Next, we need an app like this for smoking in public.
I wonder what fraction of people complaining about inconsiderate behavior in this thread, permanently use high beams when driving.
I love the ingredients for this project:
made with spite and web audio api. do whatever you want with it.Initially thought this was cloning and doing TTS, but then I looked at the html file. I'm dumb lol
So, a tool that ends up annoying more people than the first person.
This sounds like an “I want to get my ass kicked” application.
I wonder how well this would work on a street preacher if connected to a megaphone.
Audio jacks have to come back.
I have to admit: I found the two seconds delay quite entertaing there.
Isn’t delayed auditory feedback similar to echo?
Yea it can basically short circuit your thinking when trying to talk, BUT oddly enough it helps with stuttering with a short enough interval. There's in-ear attachments people can use that do this exact thing and it helps reduce the amount of stuttering and the brain getting stuck on a sound. My brother uses one, its crazy how it works
Yeah, this immediately made me think of DAF.
My wife is a speech pathologist and hooked me up to a DAF machine for some research, and the effect was totally shocking to me as a layperson. I think I did worse than average, but I was basically unable to speak with delayed sidetone.
If speaking strictly in terms of audio effects this is a delay, with "echo" usually implying feedback so the delayed signal is attenuated and fed back into the delay line, getting quieter each iteration and fading naturally.
It's like a single bounce. Echo effects usually have multiple bounces, each quieter than the one before it.
Is this an iOS app? Android?
This is why going to the gym matters
Do people talk on speakerphone in the gym too? so desensitization? :)
Dislike for ai profile picture
You need it to be 200ms not 2 seconds
Delayed Auditory Feedback (DAF) is the term you need to look into. Playing back what someone says to you back at them with a 200ms delay is literally a brain Denial of Service.
Doesn’t work on my phone
> made with spite
Prompted with spite
this whole app is just theatrical programming. a vibe coded repo built so this guy could share a made-up anecdote about when he was passive-aggressive at the airport. By the author's own admission, even the name "STFU" was ripped from someone else's app that does the exact same thing
We don't even get to see it in action! It's just the code, a gesture at what's possible if one could be bothered to pull the repo and run it themselves. "person asks LLM for an app that does audio recording and playback with a delay". fascinating, thank you
P.S. the so called "discussion" thread linked in the repo is wild. "Garbage will be there everywhere... Have zero hope in the political system regardless of party in power" what does this have to do with anything man, i'm just trying to look at cool dev articles
Im from LA... the type of people who play music or talk on speaker are not the kinda people you'd want to do this too.. This sounds like a perfect way to get stabbed.
Fun light hearted github, that will passively agressively get someone killed.
And the award goes to “STFU” for best practical use of AI.
This is so passive aggressive. I kinda love it and hate it if that makes sense.
We are at the stage where we can engage in AI warfare with bespoke AI generated weapons.
Nice.
solving problems with tech that are solvable with speaking to ppl is crazy social anxiety spares no one
My personal take is that having phone conversations at normal speaker volume is fine because people also talk amongst each other in public and there is no substantial difference, but watching videos or even listening to music on loud speaker is not okay because it's a public nuisance.
However, it seems that the cultural norms differ a lot, I've heard of people who disapprove of almost everything and don't have much sympathy for them. Politeness goes both ways, and in my opinion using that app is impolite, too.
There is a substantial difference between people talking amongst themselves and one person on a phone.
Humans are social animals, we tune out conversations easily. Half conversations are just one interrupting, attention-grabbing … jarring start … … after … … … … another. It’s a series of unpredictable spontaneous one-sided outbursts, behaviours that otherwise belong to disturbed individuals.
Listening to people in the phone is inherently more annoying, backed by decent research IIRC.
Phone speakers are tinny and sharp and I find them a lot more annoying.
I wonder if the future of AI is that we all just create our own programs out of thin air like this. Like if I need something, I just describe it to AI, and within seconds, it's generated and ready to use.
Operating systems become redundant; you open any digital device, and it's just a portal into the most advanced LLM on the planet.
Obviously just spitballing here.
I wonder how far AI will advance.
Operating systems, no. You still have to access what is going to be standardized hardware and make the analog bits behave digitally at low power.
Applications, yea, 100%.
I found it interesting that the OP defaulted to using an AI agent for his voice recording software rather than doing a Google search. Perhaps a sign of things to come? I would've chosen Google, but maybe I'll be falling behind in the future.
Aside from getting an LLM up and running on a device, what's stopping AI from creating an operating system? I admittedly don't know much about operating system development, but aren't most operating systems written primarily in C?
I guess what I meant by that is it would be interesting if the AI prompt itself were the OS, and all software would be generated via prompting the agent. No downloads, just a "What do you need?" prompt with the AI generating everything on the fly.
Perhaps becoming so fast that you wouldn't even notice it thinking. Just: "I need to edit a document that was sent to my email" The AI would then retrieve the email, download the document and generate its own text editor to display the document in. All within a few milliseconds.
Call it AIOS
>AI from creating an operating system?
Nothing really... Creating a working operating system and understanding all the hardware bugs it could run into is a different story.
Simply put when you look at the combined energy expenditure to create something like Windows or Linux and the numbers would likely stagger a person, like hundreds of gigawatts, hell probably terrawatts. This entropy expenditure is reduced by us sharing the code. This is the same reason we don't have that many top end AI models. The amount of energy you need to spend for one is massive.
Intelligence doesn't mean you should do everything yourself. Sharing and stealing are solutions used in the animal kingdom as alternate solutions to the limited fuel problem.
Hardware bugs can be documented for an LLM to learn from; it's really just a chicken-and-egg problem. There are plenty of open-source, working operating systems for LLMs to learn from as well.
And yes, I understand code re-use and distribution are valuable, and that's a good point. Having an LLM generate everything on the fly is definitely energy-intensive, but that hasn't stopped the world from building massive data centers to support it, regardless.
I guess the theory of my past few posts would be similar to rolling updates, so using the text editor as an example, you'd prompt the AI agent in the hypothetical OS to open a document, and it would generate a word processor on the fly, referencing the dozens of open source repos for word processors and pushing its own contributions back out into the world for reference by other LLMs - computationally expensive, yes. It would then learn from your behaviors, utilizing the program, and the next time you'd prompt the OS for a word-processor-like feature (I'm imagining an MS-DOS-like prompt), it would iterate on that existing idea or program - less computationally expensive because ideally the bulk of the work is already learned. Perhaps adding new features or key-bindings as it sees fit. I understand that hard-disk space is cheap, and you'd probably want some space to store personal files, but the OS could theoretically load your program directly into RAM once it's compiled from AI-generated source code. Removing the need to save programs themselves to disk.
Since LLMs are globally distributed, they're learning from all human interactions and are actively developing cutting-edge word processors tailored specifically to the end-users' needs. More of a VIM-style user? The LLM can pick up on that, prefer something more like MS Word? The LLM is learning that too. AIOS slowly becomes geared directly to you, the end-user.
That really has nothing to do with intelligence; you're just teaching a computer how to compute, which is what AI is all about.
Just some ideas on what the future might hold.
I’ve read several dozen comments, but I haven’t come across the following stated quite this way:
One option is to politely ask someone if they have headphones and/or to turn it down.
Cont’d from ^: you can often lubricate the situation by giving some “reason” that lets the other person save face. You can be genuine or creative or both. (You might say you just really had a rough day and would appreciate quiet.)
As a point of comparison, think about how many drivers forget to turn on their headlights even after the sun goes down. Some fraction of people screw up in spite of their self-interest.
If you are genuinely afraid of speaking to someone, listen to your gut. Just try to check this against reality… if this happens at 1000X the rate of crime in the area, you might be miscalibrated.
You might consider talking to Mr Blaring McLoud without mentioning your annoyance at first. This might help get you one step closer to asking nicely later.
Some people are genuinely unaware, so erring on the side of kindness is a smart step one. Even when asking nicely without snark or impugning someone’s pride, you might still face rude behavior. I like the phrase “don’t mistake kindness for weakness.” You can walk away and figure out what you want to do next, knowing that you gave the other person a chance.
I absolutely hate the people who walk around or bike around or skate and carry a big speaker and force everyone else to listen to their garbage music.
Always garbage music. I heard one of them playing Bryan Adams' "Summer of '69" (or whatever it's called), so not all new garbage either.
So now there is two obnoxious people blaring sound? If you didn't have the courage to speak up, how are you going to have the courage to disrupt them and others?
The fact that this occurred in Bombay is important context. In India, the culture amongst older people is to have a clear sense of where you fit in the hierarchy. You might be verbally abusive to those who you consider below you, but you will remain silent and deferent to those who are considered economically/socially superior. This manifests as a certain class of people who have never been called out on any of their obnoxious behavior, because their economic/social status has shielded them from criticism for their entire lives. Meanwhile a majority of society is perfectly accustomed to being verbally abused, to the point where someone like me saying "please" and "thank you" makes it clear that I am of the Indian diaspora.
By the way, I've noticed that the younger crowd in India leans much more toward egalitarianism and tends to reject bizarre social constructs like caste. The fact that a young guy also thought of this solution speaks to their ingenuity as well.
Think it through just a tiny bit more. It’s more socially acceptable to be angry back at someone who is confronting you directly than someone who may or may not be making an example of you but in a passive way. Therefore it’s less likely the other individual will confront you back, or perhaps more importantly it would make them look more unreasonable for doing so.
Social pressure is a real thing and it affects both behaviour and outcomes, it’d be silly to ignore that.
> It’s more socially acceptable to be angry back at someone who is confronting you directly than someone who may or may not be making an example of you but in a passive way.
I actually agree with this. And similarly, I'd argue that it's more socially acceptable to use this audio repeater than to "nicely" confront someone who is so brazenly violating social norms.
The people who react angrily to someone asking them to keep their noise down are very likely the same people who react angrily to someone interrupting their call or entertainment with loud noises, especially noises that just repeat what they're saying or watching. I agree social pressure is a real thing, but if you don't have the courage to ask them to kindly keep the volume down, how would you have the courage to do this?
You don't have to figure out what to say back to the person. It is hearing their own self that makes them want to STFU. Apparently hearing their voice is just as annoying to them as it is to us?
Does it really take "courage" to speak up in cases like this? If anything, it's just as insulting to point out to an adult that playing loud audio in a crowded public place is inappropriate, as if they didn't know that!
Yes, it does take courage, the person doing it is likely to react poorly and it could easily escalate into a physical altercation.
for me, the worst offenders are men watching sports on public transportation or restaurants. I hate it, but I think different cultures have different norms.
It takes a bit of experience and tact. Saying "excuse me, would you mind turning down your phone a bit, please" as an opening request would not likely be confrontational especially in someplace like an airport. Few people are going to be itchy to start a fight over something like that in a place full of cameras, witnesses, security people, and with fairly limited exits.
It can create an awkward situation which a lot of people are averse to. For example, I wouldn't speak up on other forms of public transport, but in airports in particular I go on a warpath.
That person is already ignoring obvious social conventions. People don't want to know which other shitty behaviours they have in store.
Is fighting antisocial behavior with more antisocial behavior really necessary?
There is no singular solution that fits all situations. This entire discussion is pointless.
I think it's worse that you have to behave maliciously. They have a right to make sound in public places. I'm not one of those people who plays stuff on full volume in public places but sometimes I am a bit noisy. I think back to when I'm having fun and it often involves a bunch of noise. Society is becoming way too intolerant and conformist.
Doesn't the right to make sound in public places extend to the hypothetical users of this app?
I don't think a rights-based framing is the best way to look at this. It's about courtesy and respect for social norms.
I don't see how society is becoming too intolerant, if anything I think we are more tolerant of anti-social behavior than ever before.
The hypothetical users of the app will use it to shut down noise in public places.
You are the one defending anti-social behavior here.
If you don't like noise, don't go outside where other humans are. If you use psychological manipulation because you think people are playing videos too loud, maybe take a deep look in the mirror before talking about courtesy and respect.
Why not use headphones, so you can enjoy noise without bothering people who don’t like noise? Some noise can be uncomfortable to people at an airport. Movies with gunfire or shouting for example.
It's absurd that people would all have to carry around and use headphones just because some people don't want noise in public. I would agree that loud gunfire isn't appropriate in an airport but that's not the case here and you're misconstruing the situation to make your case sound better.
If they have a right to play their sounds in a public place, then I also have the right to play the same sounds in the same public place at almost, but not exactly, the same time.
You should absolutely do that and play it as loud as you want. What if the other person doesn't want to be manipulated and just plays it louder?
No one is saying don't make noise. They are saying be considerate of those around you. It is not a radical idea.
So you would advocate for someone to do this in public against someone else playing a video on their phone? Do you think this is the most considerate option?
Considerate? Yes, I'll consider leaving you alone. If it seems that you're having an actual problem, I'll even leave you alone. But if you're being rude because you haven't considered that others might not be interested in listening to your tiktok videos repeat endlessly, then when I take that into consideration it will likely have a negative effect on how I decide to treat you.
I'll also take into consideration whether or not you appear to be homeless if you stink (choosing not to shower and deciding not to shower are two different things). I'll take into consideration who it sounds like you're talking to when you're telling on the phone ("are you ok" vs interminable conversations on speakerphone in the break room/restaurant/other public places). If you're playing loud music in your car, before calling you out I'll consider whether the doors are open (you might not realize) or if you have the windows open (sharing your music choices with the world).
Consideration is the entire point. It doesn't mean letting people do whatever they like, it means judging (thinking about) then before doing anything. You have every like right to play your video, and I have every right to get annoyed at you for doing it without being considerate yourself.
Considerate: 1. Having or showing regard for the needs or feelings of others. synonym: thoughtful. Similar: thoughtful 2. Characterized by careful thought; deliberate. 3. Given to consideration or to sober reflection; regardful of consequences or circumstances; circumspect; careful; esp. careful of the rights, claims, and feelings of others.
Airports aren't outside and they have a natural tendency to irritate people just by nature of existing. They aren't nice places and there's no need to make it worse by playing annoying TikToks
Hey HN! Check out this vibe-coded shell script that Claude Opus one-shot that does the same thing(Pretty CrAzY!!!).
This is a fish shell function but you can probably get claude code to convert it to bash or zsh
function STFU
#alsa records incoming audio from the default input device for 2 seconds
arecord --duration 2 echo.wav
#alsa plays back the echo.wav of the recorded audio file
aplay echo.wav
#Ctrl+C when the target looks your way!!!
end
STFU
(Yes this is post is entirely sarcasm, except that I do use fish as my default shell.)