iPods As The Antidote To Mobile Phone Chatter

from the let-everyone-else-go-deaf dept

While a bunch of folks are covering the old story about how iPods can make you go deaf (something we mentioned seven months ago), someone in Chicago has found the flip side of that coin. iPods are making public places quiet again. Apparently, the guy writing the column noticed that his morning commute had become respectfully quiet again, after many years of constant loud and annoying chatter -- much of it on mobile phones. The reason for the silence? Everyone's plugged into their iPods (going deaf, apparently). Of course, maybe the guy had just spent too much time listening to his own iPod in the past, and now can't hear well enough to know that the sound of silence he hears is only in his own ears.
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  • identicon
    Joe Schmoe, 20 Dec 2005 @ 10:48am

    No Subject Given

    As a chicago train rider (though this applies across the board), I have a different take. While I do not appreciate people who speak loud enough for the entire cab to hear, I do recognise that it is a public space and expect people to talk.

    What I do find annoying, exceedingly, like nails on a friggin chalk board, is peope who cannot form a single without the word "like". Over and over, and over, every third word out of their mouths over...

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 20 Dec 2005 @ 12:39pm

      Re: No Subject Given

      What annoys me are people who cannot form a coherent sentence ranting about the decay of language.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        Joe Schmoe, 20 Dec 2005 @ 1:50pm

        Re: No Subject Given

        I'm sure I have many faults myself. And having complained, I've declared open season on myself. Have fun. Cheers.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

        • identicon
          hautedawg, 20 Dec 2005 @ 2:12pm

          Re: No Subject Given

          It's like, when you like, don't like, have a grasp on like, the language? And like, can't stand it when like, other people can't like, deal with it? (that honestly hurt to write)

          link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Rikko, 20 Dec 2005 @ 1:01pm

      Re: No Subject Given

      Joe, wait until those same people email you.

      It's pretty hard to bite your lip and not tell your own relatives that you won't write them back until they gain a grade 2 grasp of the English language.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Don 'Bear' Wikinson, 20 Dec 2005 @ 4:54pm

    Stimulaholics

    I think it is quieter on the BART (above and below ground electric) trains in the San Francisco Bay Area recently.
    When you have your iPod in your ear, you don't hear the cellphone ringing. Everyone around you does, though. But, I'll take the short term nuisance of your phone ringing unanswered over the several minutes of near yelling that follows an answered ring.
    People don't realize that just because it's hard for you to hear the other party does not mean you need to be yelling. (These are the same people who yell into speakerphones - not realizing that they have fairly sensitive microphones...)
    It's my observation that some people can't stand doing nothing. So whether it's a cellphone or an iPod or the newspaper, they need stimulation. Input. Something to constrain or neutralize their thoughts. Otherwise, they'd be left to comtemplate the simple beauty around them. Or, the utter fallacy and uselessness of their existence.

    link to this | view in chronology ]


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