At the Last Hope hackers conference in New York City the inventor of the infamous TV B Gone talked about his current projects, but also reminisced about the past.
Mitch Altman
And even though I stopped watching TVs at home there were TVs popping up everwhere I went. I was just at a restaurant with friends and there was a TV on in the corner and we were paying attention to it even though we didn't want to. I thought wouldn't it be cool if we could turn those things off everywhere we went and get rid of those distractions. And I'm a geek so I immediately knew what to do.
Since Altman created the small device in 2004 he said he's sold more than 160,000 of them and at the hackers conference he had a workshop where attendees can solder and program their own TV B Gone and other devices.
You may remember TV B Gone's notorious spree at this year's Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Some mischief makers used the device to turn over the number of Tvs on display at the show. Altman didn't endorse it.
Well you know I would have never had done that because these are people doing their job and its disrupting them. I don't think it's going to ever hurt any company's revenue because it is just a tv that turned off after all and they can turn it back on. People seeing the presentation are going to feel sorry for the person doing it. And even though I would never do it, I did think it was funny.
In an evening session at the show another hacker talked about that same incident, yet disagreed with Mitch on the possible impact.
I don't encourage anyone to try this because look at that Motorola guy. He's standing there trying to do his job and sell his product and some guy in the front row is screwing around with him. That's just not cool, I'm sorry. The big wall of TVs, that's ok, but causing somebody grief and possible lost sales, that's just not kosher.
Aside from the TV B Gone Altman's next project, which could also be built at the Last Hope work stations is called the Brain Machine. It uses lights and sounds to lull users into a hypnotic trance.
Blinking lights in some glasses and some sounds in headphones. And your brain synchronizes to the brain wave sequences present that way and you get into a really meditative state that way. What makes it super fun is that you hallucinate colors and patterns from your subconscious along the way and people tend to like that
For some, it seemed to work.
Thomas L.
Last Hope attendee
I thought I was somewhere else. I thought I was somewhere I had been before. Many times I would have this feeling, a flash, of somewhere I had been before. Very strange, very interesting. My perception of time change for sure. Just less than 2 hours
He actually only wore the glasses for about 3 minutes. Others weren't so impressed.
Noli Ergas
It was relaxing. I had to set an alarm so that I'd wake up on time. I guess I didn't quite get the experience that I was expecting.
Altman will soon be mass producing the Brain Machine at a factory in China. For the IDG News Service, I'm Nick Barber reporting in New York.
