Basically chairs to be assembled around a meeting table that would have a means of providing feedback to whomever is presently speaking. The speaker would have to engage his/her chair to be recognized. The feedback would emanate from a small hidden dial on all of the chairs - turned to the right (1 to 10) would be approval to the left (1-10) disapproval. A computer would sum the feedback of all members present to the person speaking (kind of like the croissant and fish sums). The effect on the chair could vary it might be as benign as deflating the cushion so that the occupant's buttocks would rest directly on a hard (or bumpy) uncomfortable surface. If the person decided to continue on ignoring the censure, then the dials might be turned up to produce unpleasant prodding. If all dials were turned all the way to the left then small shocks might be felt. This would result in brief effective meetings with no rambling on about dead horses. In order to not completely stifle unpopular but good ideas you could get like two or three exemptions from "the chair" per year to express an idea free of censure - they would need to be used wisely.
-- chironic, Jan 05 2004

(??) bluberries http://www.halfbake.../www.blackberry.com
[theircompetitor, Oct 04 2004]

we use blueberries for this, but excellent +
-- theircompetitor, Jan 05 2004


at any meeting I'm at now there's a second meeting going on via handhelds. Very distracting, which is the point.

Would kill for a two player chess module for these, but there's for some reason there's no current one -- there was a company that did it but folded.
-- theircompetitor, Jan 05 2004


what happens if you alienate your boss to the point of you loosing a job?
-- Space-Pope, Jan 05 2004


The boss would have to fire everyone at the meeting because each of the chairs has an input device. Plus only a really cool boss would actually sit in an active chair.
-- chironic, Jan 06 2004



random, halfbakery