Saw this project over on Instructables and thought it had the makings of a fun little practical joke:
This instructable was a LONG time coming. I had come up with this idea a while ago, after hearing about the details behind some basic "speech jamming" anomalies that occur when people use intercom systems. Basically, the intercom would introduce an ever so slight delay to the output of the speaker, so you would end up hearing an echo. I had planned on making this many months ago, as I previously stated but I was going to try and go discrete, aka, use a micro-controller and attempt to program some sort of delay code. But alas, I never could figure it out.
Then I found out about a very, very neat little IC, the PT2399. This thing is the heart of this circuit, and is actually pretty impressive considering the pricing.
This echo is typically within the range of 200 mS - 700 mS, and it varies a bit. But, what happens when this delayed speech hits your ears?
You have a tendency to start stumbling over your words, and you more or less, just lose your train of thought. I'm thinking this may be due to the way your brain processes your words; since there's an inherent "delay" that your mind creates, it somehow interferes with your speech processing center.
It's a pretty funny thing to play with and show people the effects of. However it's not foolproof; if you concentrate hard enough, and speak slowly you can overcome the effects of the jammer. It's still amusing to see your friends think "oh, this'll be easy!" and then proceed to have the speech capability of a 2-year-old.
Have any Soylentils done stuff like this? Share! April Fool's Day is right around the corner...
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Wednesday March 25 2015, @05:33PM
If you installed those in the two chambers of the US Congress, how long would it take for anyone to notice?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 25 2015, @05:49PM
waste of resources...unless you put one in the oval office.
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Wednesday March 25 2015, @06:10PM
I just want to see them brought to all of the presidential debates. Although there too it might be hard to catch, since all the candidates will sound like gibbering idiots regardless.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Wednesday March 25 2015, @06:43PM
If you installed those in the two chambers of the US Congress, how long would it take for anyone to notice?
The improvement would be so dramatic that I'm sure people would notice immediately!
(Score: 5, Touché) by Jeremiah Cornelius on Wednesday March 25 2015, @06:51PM
No one would notice. No difference at all.
You see? It requires the listening function of the human ear to be operative...
You're betting on the pantomime horse...
(Score: 3, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 25 2015, @06:55PM
Well, it's going on 30 years now, and no one has turned them off.
I knew batteries wouldn't last long enough, so I wired them into the mains electric, but I would have thought the janitors, at least, would have found them. Maybe they just dust around them?
As for the public noticing the effects, I think everyone is now pretty aware how inane everyone in either of those two rooms sound. If anything, it's surprising that it seems the more exposure to the effect, the more likely it is to continue outside the influence of the devices.
(Score: 2) by Jeremiah Cornelius on Wednesday March 25 2015, @07:39PM
They are too busy watching THIS to notice: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J01ECGcbA2I [youtube.com]
You're betting on the pantomime horse...
(Score: 4, Interesting) by zugedneb on Wednesday March 25 2015, @05:37PM
In the discworld novels (Terry Pratchett) patriarch Vetinari had such a mechanical clock in the hall, and everyone waiting for audience had to spend a while listening to the slightly delayed or early tick-tocks...
The theory was that it will be difficult to think after a while...
Try this too, and tell us about the outcome =)
old saying: "a troll is a window into the soul of humanity" + also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Ajax
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Jaruzel on Wednesday March 25 2015, @05:42PM
I remember seeing on HackADay some projects that built a Vetinari Clock, can't find the the links right now, but I did find this [tindie.com].
This is my opinion, there are many others, but this one is mine.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by infodragon on Wednesday March 25 2015, @06:17PM
I have experienced this a few times when the cell connection I had was messed up pretty bad. There was an echo of my voice that the recipient couldn't hear. It made it very difficult to have a manful conversation and each time I ended up hanging up and calling back. It's quite disorienting and very frustrating!
Don't settle for shampoo, demand real poo!
(Score: 2) by TK-421 on Wednesday March 25 2015, @07:00PM
You should have waited until Sports Center was over before calling back. Unless you are a dude in which case the best time for a manful conversation is during Sports Center.
(Score: 2) by infodragon on Wednesday March 25 2015, @08:06PM
LOL! So much for spell check and preview... I meant meaningful!
Don't settle for shampoo, demand real poo!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 26 2015, @07:31AM
You should've blamed an echo only you can hear!
(Score: 2) by infodragon on Thursday March 26 2015, @09:51AM
The voices never echo and they wouldn't like it if I lied about them!
Don't settle for shampoo, demand real poo!
(Score: 2) by frojack on Wednesday March 25 2015, @11:48PM
Anyone who's ever been on stage in a large hall / gym has probably experienced this.
Never forget your ear plugs if you have to speak at one of these venues. (Ball parks are the worst, because you get a series of echos).
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by bradley13 on Wednesday March 25 2015, @06:35PM
This is a fairly common thing to find in science museums: you put on a set of headphones, and then try to recite some simple nursery rhyme. When your voice is played back to you with a delay, you start to stutter or repeat syllables (Mary had a little-ittle-ittle lamb). On the second or third attempt, most people are able to concentrate, and speak more-or-less normally.
If the delay varies randomly, ignoring it would probably be more difficult. Even so, it won't seriously stop people from talking beyond the first couple of encounters with the device. It would be a fun party idea, if it could be purchased ready-made for a reasonable price.
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by scruffybeard on Wednesday March 25 2015, @06:57PM
I experienced this first hand working at a department store in college. There was a slight delay when using the store wide intercom to page the manager, or announce a sale item to customers. It was fun watching the newbie try it for the first time, but you could train your mind to tune it out after a few tries.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by anubi on Thursday March 26 2015, @04:23AM
I experience something similar at Church and in stadiums. I refer to it as "stadium-mouth" where one receives the original signal along with multiple copies of the original shifted by several milliseconds of each other. It drives me nuts and gives me headaches. Its very hard for me to parse it. It seems to me to be the aural equivalent of trying to read through a trick lens where you see multiple images of the same thing.
When I was younger, another man I admired a lot, Bob Widlar of National Semiconductor had a boss who liked to scream at him. He devised a little circuit, known as a hassler, which detected loud noises, shifted it in frequency, and sent it back. So when his boss got to yelling, he would become all disoriented, and when he shut up, everything returned to normal. Because the device only worked during the boss's outpourings, his boss did not detect that something else was messing him up. Story here. [hackaday.com].
Widlar was my kind of guy... he would not tolerate crap. Not at all.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 25 2015, @06:39PM
Always thought the delay in these types of conversation was two days or just an evening if you have poppers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 25 2015, @06:45PM
Back in the 70s you could buy an analog echo device that hooked into a stereo or any audio equipment. It consisted of two long springs, the first spring would vibrate the audio to the second spring, causing an echo on the output. I had it hooked up to a CB power microphone, and it would freak people out, especially when I was pushing 100 watts via a palomar linear amp.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 25 2015, @06:56PM
This here's Rubber Duck and that's a big 10-4 good buddy.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 25 2015, @08:34PM
Actually, only local CB'ers used the 10 code. When "shooting skip" we used "Q" code and different handles because Uncle Charlie (FCC) was after you for using more than 4 watts of power. You could easily reach across the country, and sometimes across the world.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by tooyoung on Wednesday March 25 2015, @07:14PM
Speaking of April Fool's Day.....please don't replicate the annoying behavior of the other site. I always hated avoiding slashdot for 3 straight days while waiting for the fake stories to disappear.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by wonkey_monkey on Wednesday March 25 2015, @07:39PM
Seconded. If anything, there should be a single fake story that's believable enough that we can have some fun trying to work out which one it is.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk
(Score: 2) by Ryuugami on Wednesday March 25 2015, @09:12PM
Sounds like Tuesday.
If a shit storm's on the horizon, it's good to know far enough ahead you can at least bring along an umbrella. - D.Weber
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Thursday March 26 2015, @01:31PM
That's an idea. Make it like the puzzle games on NPR: those who guess the right answer are entered into a drawing to win SN swag (or something).
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 3, Funny) by francois.barbier on Wednesday March 25 2015, @08:40PM
PONIES!!!
(Score: 3, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 25 2015, @09:16PM
Even better would be a green theme so this site looked like Slashdot.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 25 2015, @10:09PM
better yet, a redirect there
(Score: 2) by TheGratefulNet on Thursday March 26 2015, @01:41AM
wait, you mean there's -color- on this site?
maybe I have to upgrade to the rgb version of lynx...
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 26 2015, @03:41AM
You can't say "color", that's racist now. You need to use "chromaticity" when referring to that.
(Score: 2) by khedoros on Wednesday March 25 2015, @07:21PM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 25 2015, @07:37PM
Delays like this used to be common with overseas phone calls (from memory, this was 1980s)...because they went to a geosynchronous satellite and back. The delay meant that both parties talked over the other person. Unless both realized what was going on, it was easy to get angry with the other person for cutting you off all the time.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 26 2015, @07:38AM
I remember hearing that phone phreakers called themselves routing the call around the globe and would get the same effect. :)
Must've been pretty awesome.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Snotnose on Wednesday March 25 2015, @08:25PM
In the late 70s I was an electronic tech working on missile delay units. The requirement was the telemetry got broadcast immediately, again after 0.5 seconds, and again after 1 second. How did they do it? Loads of 512 byte shift registers, the output of one went to the input of the next. My memory on it is very hazy, but it had maybe 8 boards, each with 20 shift register chips.
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 5, Informative) by kaszz on Wednesday March 25 2015, @10:31PM
Dude, "mS" is not a valid unit. "ms" is the correct one, 1/1000 of a second. And why is this important? Because this time it makes sense. And the next time when there's more values and units to juggle. Readers will misinterpretate. There's a unit called Siemens which has the symbol S. And another Sievert with the symbol Sv. And so on.. so be careful.
(Score: 2) by http on Wednesday March 25 2015, @11:38PM
Just try this on someone with a speech impediment. No jury would convict them of any crime committed upon said practical joker.
I browse at -1 when I have mod points. It's unsettling.
(Score: 2) by Geezer on Thursday March 26 2015, @10:41AM
This is so freakin' cool I have to build one just to play with it.
I'll report on how it performs on Wife v2.0
(Score: 1) by SemperOSS on Thursday March 26 2015, @10:47PM
Unfortunately, I work at a place with a VoIP system that occasionally introduces such feedback, making certain calls very difficult. I find that I can overcome it if I remove one side of the headset so I only get feedback in one ear but find it much worse if I hear myself in both ears.
I wish it was a practical joke though for it has been going on for a couple of years and the ICT people cannot be bothered as it happens less than once a month per person on average.
I don't need a signature to draw attention to myself.
Maybe I should add a sarcasm warning now and again?
(Score: 2) by Techwolf on Friday March 27 2015, @01:32AM
I'vw worked at callcenter once. That echo accures when being recorded or being listened on by QA.