I live and work in LA where people use their horn on the road to yell at each other, express their urgency to change lanes, or just to say hi. Even worse, offenders park illegally and honk repeatedly when picking each other up instead of calling ahead or ringing a door bell.
The device I would
like to see involves a little democratic action. Whenever a car horn abuser abuses his/her car horn, others can choose to press a button of disapproval on a wifi device, whether handheld (for the pedestrian or bicyclist) or steering-wheel-mounted (for the motorist).
After a honk, the wifi device in the offender's vehicle (everyone has one installed) receives "vote" transmissions limited to 5 seconds. Each "voter" has a unique IP address on their wifi devices as to prevent voting more than once.
Upon an offense, votes are instantly cast, tallied, and with 5 votes the offender's honking duration is limited to 5 seconds for 10 days, 10 votes 4 seconds, 15 votes 3 seconds, and so on. With 50 votes, the offender automatically loses his/her driving priveledges for 30 days. For safety reasons, no offenders horn is ever completely shut off.
When multiple honkers are involved, the offended must decide to vote to silence both offenders. Not one offender may be singled out in such an act of useless noise. The wifi range should be limited as to not accidently punish far-away honkers.