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I think you have misunderstood the parent comment. The suggestion isn’t to create configurable anc headphones but instead to create a device that is able to can

I think you have misunderstood the parent comment. The suggestion isn’t to create configurable anc headphones but instead to create a device that is able to cancel out the sound of your voice from the ears of other people around you so you can speak in public privately. The problem is you can’t possibly work out exactly how and when the sound will hit each set of ears around you to be able to direct a beam of sound to their ears (assuming it’s even possible to have such directional sound) The problem is significantly easier with headphones. You have a headphone and speaker in between your ears and the sound. The distance between the microphone and your ears is constant so you can perfectly time the negative sounds.

ngneer 6y ago
I never said it would be easy, but you make a good point. Compensating based on other sets of ears would be tough, because their locations are unknown and change fast. Directional sound is possible to an extent, Woody Norris gave a TED talk about it a long while back, it is called hypersonic sound. I think it uses ultrasound to generate compressions and rarefactions far away. I realize it sounds like science fiction, but you could perhaps transduce sound to electricity and again to sound, sending the signal of your voice away from you faster than the speed of sound, in time for a cancellation wave to be generated and have an effect. I suppose the analogy would be quiescing a ripple in a pond.
mortenjorck 6y ago
There was a product announced a few years back called Hushme that proposed to accomplish this goal. It attempted to create an acoustic seal around the wearer's mouth, and somewhat predictably, it looked ridiculous: https://www.news.com.au/technology/gadgets/wearables/this-cant-be-the-price-to-pay-for-phone-privacy-in-public/news-story/a54e49eb556eb7bf3a58d669aec9c1eb https://www.news.com.au/technology/gadgets/wearables/this-ca...
- ngneer 6y ago
  Neat, but weird. Muzzleme is more like it.

ngneer 6y ago

I never said it would be easy, but you make a good point. Compensating based on other sets of ears would be tough, because their locations are unknown and change fast. Directional sound is possible to an extent, Woody Norris gave a TED talk about it a long while back, it is called hypersonic sound. I think it uses ultrasound to generate compressions and rarefactions far away. I realize it sounds like science fiction, but you could perhaps transduce sound to electricity and again to sound, sending the signal of your voice away from you faster than the speed of sound, in time for a cancellation wave to be generated and have an effect. I suppose the analogy would be quiescing a ripple in a pond.

mortenjorck 6y ago

There was a product announced a few years back called Hushme that proposed to accomplish this goal. It attempted to create an acoustic seal around the wearer's mouth, and somewhat predictably, it looked ridiculous: https://www.news.com.au/technology/gadgets/wearables/this-cant-be-the-price-to-pay-for-phone-privacy-in-public/news-story/a54e49eb556eb7bf3a58d669aec9c1eb https://www.news.com.au/technology/gadgets/wearables/this-ca...

ngneer 6y ago
Neat, but weird. Muzzleme is more like it.