LookingOutward-10

For this weeks post, I decided to look at Allison Burtch’s project, Mic Jammer. In collaboration with Eric Rosenthal, Burtch created a small device that can mute people’s microphones. It works by emitting a high ultrasonic noise that is inaudible to human ears but can be heard by microphones.

I found this project interesting because of how relevant it is. Burtch describes the purpose of Mic Jammer as being like taping over your webcam, but for audio and microphones. Personally, I find that there is a growing fear of being watched through my webcam, but I never considered the possibility of being listened to through the microphone and this brings up that second possibility.

The product itself is in the beginning stages of being designed and Burtch as well comments on the fact that the next step is to collaborate with a product designer to re-engineer and design the product. I find it really interesting how the product was also designed around the iphone, specifically the iphone 4/5 and later iphone 6 when it came out. It considers the placement of the microphones (on the bottom for iphone 4/5 and two on top and two on bottom for iphone 6), trying to find best way to hit and aim for the microphones.

http://www.allisonburtch.net/mic-jammer/