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This is a volume setting for the sound on a television where, instead of the volume remaining fixed, the volume varies with the attention level of the viewers. Through a clever mixture of motion-sensing cameras, facial recognition and pupil tracking (the kind in your eye, not the other kind, before anyone
makes any cheap jokes) this television will track how many people are in the room and how many are watching the television. Then it can set the volume according to the proportion of people in the room actually watching the television.
The obvious application of this is to cut the sound during commercials if the people watching the television start to talk to each other (and stop watching the television) or leave the room. It will also prove useful if, through some terrible error of judgement, you're watching a film like "Matrix 2" with boring talky bits which don't advance the plot at all.
Sound compression in advertising
http://www.goamazin.../content.asp?id=637
A high-level description of why ads seem louder, even though their top volume is near that of the television program they interrupt. [jutta, Apr 10 2006]
[link]
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oh I see, it doesn't start shouting at you if your mind wanders off... |
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It would prove troublesome also, if a hypothetical family were watching a quiz, which involves another member of the family listening to one question, then upon hearing the answer, talking about it continuously, completely obliterating the following question as if it never occurred, only resuming attention by the third sequential question. |
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[bigsleep] The stations deny they crank the volume for ads - but admit they do compress the sound to make it *seem* louder. |
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[anaeleus] I'm curious - how does compressing the sound make it seem louder? Just curious, because I've also noticed the ADVERT VOLUME effect. |
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Doesn't 'seeming louder' and 'actually being louder' amount to the same thing? It's louder. |
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I'd agree. It probably has a negative effect for the advertisers too. Channel 4 seems the worst offender at present and I now have an almost Pavlovian response to channel surf as soon as an ad-break is about to begin. At the very least I hit mute, and I'd bet many others do the same. |
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<on topic> So I'm struggling to hear the sound that fascinating documentary about the building of Hong Kong Airport. Only my kids are in the room and won't shut up talking - and then the bloody volume goes *down* as a result. |
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How long before the little darlings work out that they can totally screw the sound on any programme that I or their siblings want to watch? |
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You'll be telling me to start acting like a parent and take notice of them next... |
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[+] simply because of the wars this would create: "Mummy, it's not fair. Andrew's looking away from the telly again and pretending to talk." |
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Maybe what we need instead is something like this combined with bluetooth headphones. If you aren't paying attention to the programming YOUR volume gets turned down. At no point is the audio broadcast to the room in general allowing people not watching to carry on a normal conversation without shouting over the TV. The volume on the headsets could also automatically compensate for ambient noise levels. |
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By the way, the advertisers would fight this for all they're worth. |
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