Cube Privacy Via Gibberish 151
fury88 writes "CNN is running a story on a new device created by Herman Miller to help with lack of privacy in the cube life. It's apparently a device that will spit out gibberish when you are talking on the phone. You record a few words as instructed by the device and when you are having conversations that may be private, it will spit out sounds that sound like a clone of yourself all talking at once. Frankly I have to think this would be annoying after awhile. As if dealing with your project manager sitting next to you wasn't enough, now you get to hear several versions of your Project Manager talking at once. Talk about insanity!"
Only for cubes? (Score:4, Insightful)
400 bucks?!? (Score:3, Insightful)
There are headphones that cancel noise (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm not sure it's feasible, but it'd be a cool idea.
If you need and want privacy.... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Cellphones (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:400 bucks?!? (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't know what you consider to be important, but plenty of software engineers work in cubicles while management sits in comfy offices. I once was on a site where engineers who worked on classified information sat in an open room at a big round desk with computers... kind of like a campus computer lab. They certainly seemed to require privacy, but lacked it.
The simple fact of the matter is that most successful companies would probably do what you're talking about. Most companies, however, are run by people who are just ahead of "trying to get by," and populated by engineers who are "just getting by." In those companies, the execs walk around with high powered computer that they don't need, while the engineers work at 5+ year old machines. Certainly, the average programmer needs something better... though this solution IS annoying.
Re:There are headphones that cancel noise (Score:5, Insightful)
Those are called "offices." Some time ago, when you got an office job with a large company, you were assigned one of these "offices" to do your work. They even had these other novel things called "doors" which were like small wall sections on hinges that could be swung in and out of the opening used to go into and out of the "office." Imagine, your own space where the walls extended from the floor all the way to the ceiling, and a door to boot! These were popular in times where one also would frequently work for the same company for a long time and get additional perks such as "health care" and this other neat thing called a "pension" where the company continued to pay part of your salary after you worked for them for thirty or so years and stopped working, called "retirement."
(Yes, that is sarcasm you smell)
Just a thought... (Score:5, Insightful)
But then my sympathy for people that expect the "right" to make or accept personal calls at work in the first place is somewhere in the vicinity of zero anyways.
If the conversation is work-related and still needs to be private, then one has a perfectly legitimate reason to have access to a telephone in a more private area than one's cubicle anyways. If the conversation isn't work related, one just has to bite the bullet and accept the fact that there is no reason why they should be afforded the luxury of increased privacy for such an activity. If they _REALLY_ need increased privacy for a personal call, they can ask their boss to see if he'll allow it. If personal calls are infrequent enough and the reason is legitimate, even if not work-related, they may permit it anyways.
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)