Reminds me of TV remotes that worked with sound. Both before my time but very interesting to read about.
Most notably the Zenith Space Command
https://www.theverge.com/23810061/zenith-space-command-remote-control-button-of-the-month
tl;dr: There are little “chimes” of different lengths that produce sound when struck. The sound is higher than what humans can hear. The four buttons on the remote lift strikers and then drop them against the chimes. It’s basically a toy piano.
We had one when I was a kid, hand-me-down from grandma. We also had a dog who wore a fairly loose stainless steel choker chain. When he’d bounce around, the chain links would clink, occasionally turning the TV on/off, changing the channel, muting the volume.
I had a cheap programmable multicolor LED lightbulb that used this technology but worse, as it used audible chirping produced by an app. The beeps were earsplittingly high pitched and had to be played LOUDLY to work.
Occasionally the bulb sensor would hear god knows what noise from outside (nothing in that neighborhood sounded even remotely like the app’s digital harpy screeches) and SUDDENLY ACTIVATE ITS PARTY STROBE LIGHT MODE.
I let my roommate keep it when I moved out.
The phone system worked like that! Rumors had it some people could do the sound to a number …
Phreaking, if you’d like to explore it more.
It’s so gratifying to hear from people on the internet who are older than I am. And this article reads like it bounced off a Listserv to a yahoo email address.
You don’t even need to go that far to see this technology in action. In the Eastern Europe we got microcomputers pretty late but that also meant our journey through the technological advancements from 1990 to 2010 started with a trickle of obsolete western stuff but then became a wild rollercoaster ride. At close to 40 I remember games being transmitted on the scout radio. You could also get games from magazines which simply printed source code.
As Wi-Fi is a form of radio technology, we still basically do this today.
mmmm, that’s the good stuff
This reminds me that I once read about a Thompson Twins game that was distributed as a flexi disc record. In order to actually play the game it had to be copied to a cassette first. Apparently it’s pretty rare, since it was only available as a bonus with a specific issue of a magazine.
videogames killed the radio star.
