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Car phone airbag
A little extra potential padding for the noggin - just in case! | |
This is a safety device for the insanely busy person who must conduct business deals on the cell phone while in the middle of rush hour city traffic. It is especially indicated for the person who refuses to buy a hands-free adapter even though his/her car is a manual transmission. Place an appropriately
small airbag with a small charge in it to immediately activate in the event of a crash which also damages the phone. I realize this could be potentially dangerous, too, having a compressed gas charge adjacent to your head, but nothing's perfect. It might just save someone's life so he/she can live to drive-talk-crash again.
Bezos patent application
http://androidandme...ile-device-airbags/ [theircompetitor, Aug 12 2011]
PROTECTING DEVICES FROM IMPACT DAMAGE
http://appft.uspto....0&RS=DN/20110194230 Hmmm, no public disclosure....? [Dub, Aug 16 2011]
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Annotation:
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Don't encourage the homicidal bastards. There's no call
so important you can't pull over.
For those busily insane people cell phones should be
fitted with small explosive charges that will blow their
heads off if a call is made or received while the car is in
motion. Kill them before they kill you. |
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Um, okay, I'm all for not talking and driving, but you two just creeped this thread right out. <=P |
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More resembles a rocket engine than an explosive, but it is a very fast reaction. |
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I thought of this idea but in the context of protecting this phone. If the accelerometer detects freefall, the aforementioned bag bursts out and the phone bounces gaily away to a soft landing. |
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BUNGCO engineers are still trying to enable the phone to detect when it is in freefall, but also in your pants. |
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Would not the phone's proximity sensor suffice for that? |
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The proximity sensor is too specific: just identifying
whether it's next to the person's face. |
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The accelerometer can easily detect free-fall. You need
to differentiate between a cell phone falling and a person
jumping with the phone in a pocket. You could probably
do that by detecting a rate of spin. That means that if
you drop the phone and it falls without spinning very
much, the airbag won't go off, but I'm guessing that most
of the time when a cell phone falls it will be spinning
faster than a person would spin in most situations. Just
don't carry the cell phone while practicing your triple
axel jumps. The simple accelerometer in a phone won't
detect spin, but you might be able to use the
magnetometer for that. |
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// The proximity sensor is too specific: just identifying
whether it's next to the person's face. // |
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It also detects proximity to the interior of a pocket just
fine. I know this because my phone (before it broke)
would
usually refuse to wake up if I pressed the power button
while it was in my pocket. EDIT: You could also use the
touchscreen to detect leg contact. |
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Regarding spin, that's a good idea. Many phones have
gyroscopes too now. |
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Inhibits the use of the phone whilst engaging in a demanding gymnastics regimen. This is unacceptable. [-] |
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