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Full disclosure: I work for an audio beacon startup (in bio). You're correct about microphone permissions related to the SDK. On iOS, this means displaying th

Full disclosure: I work for an audio beacon startup (in bio). You're correct about microphone permissions related to the SDK. On iOS, this means displaying the top colored bar when you're using the microphone too... IMHO it's not something you can just turn on and not realize it's being used. We use our listening tech at concerts and event to distribute triggered content and messages from the speaker infrastructure to attendees' phones (ex. "this drink line is long, go to the other one", "here's a free song from the artist on stage right now", "<sponsor> is giving away a free thing", etc.)

geon 11y ago
Why not just use bluetooth beacons for that?
- tedmiston 11y ago
  The strongest answer is that bluetooth beacons don't work well in huge infrastructure. Sometimes you don't have a place for them to go or they get stolen. Also it's free to use the speaker infrastructure, but outfitting and managing hundreds of beacons is not cheap. Some of our clients have switched to audio beacons for similar reasons. The Brooklyn Museum did a nice writeup of why bluetooth beacons at scale didn't work for them. https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/community/blogosphere/2015/02/04/the-realities-of-installing-ibeacon-to-scale/ https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/community/blogosphere/2015/02...
  - rasz_pl 11y ago
    Yes, BT beacons are not cheap when you buy $100 ones from a startup, also whole article was TLDR:'if only we could but a can of spray paint and change color of beacons, but we cant so oh well'
    - makomk 11y ago
      Those beacons have some kind of rubberized case; you can't really spray-paint that. (Also, last I heard the cheaper beacons still weren't terribly cheap and had awful battery life.)
      - ryoshu 11y ago
        HM-10s are a couple bucks in bulk, but managing a large deploy is still difficult.
- mojuba 11y ago
  (Not the original commenter) I suppose because of the short range relative to concert venue sizes, and because generally BLE sucks.
azinman2 11y ago
iOS is red when you put the app in the bg but not when in the fg

geon 11y ago

Why not just use bluetooth beacons for that?

tedmiston 11y ago
The strongest answer is that bluetooth beacons don't work well in huge infrastructure. Sometimes you don't have a place for them to go or they get stolen. Also it's free to use the speaker infrastructure, but outfitting and managing hundreds of beacons is not cheap. Some of our clients have switched to audio beacons for similar reasons. The Brooklyn Museum did a nice writeup of why bluetooth beacons at scale didn't work for them. https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/community/blogosphere/2015/02/04/the-realities-of-installing-ibeacon-to-scale/ https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/community/blogosphere/2015/02...
- rasz_pl 11y ago
  Yes, BT beacons are not cheap when you buy $100 ones from a startup, also whole article was TLDR:'if only we could but a can of spray paint and change color of beacons, but we cant so oh well'
  - makomk 11y ago
    Those beacons have some kind of rubberized case; you can't really spray-paint that. (Also, last I heard the cheaper beacons still weren't terribly cheap and had awful battery life.)
    - ryoshu 11y ago
      HM-10s are a couple bucks in bulk, but managing a large deploy is still difficult.
mojuba 11y ago
(Not the original commenter) I suppose because of the short range relative to concert venue sizes, and because generally BLE sucks.

azinman2 11y ago

iOS is red when you put the app in the bg but not when in the fg