Have you ever been in a queue somewhere — or waiting at the airport gate or doctor's office — where they're playing 24-hour news and you just wished you could turn it off?
Scott Blew, an engineer in Los Angeles, got sick of being flooded with endless bad news and television ads on public screens, so he decided to create a pair of sunglasses that can block out the screens.
He remembered an article he had read before which was about a special kind of film (薄膜) that could block out LED and LCD light. So he decided to try ordering some of the film and putting it on an ordinary pair of sunglasses — and he was delighted to find that it worked perfectly.
With the help of artist Ivan Cash, the two friends designed the IRL Glasses, which stands for "in real life".
The sunglasses use a special kind of polarized lens (偏光镜片) that blocks the light. When someone wears the glasses in a sports bar, for instance, and looks around, the TV screens magically seem to go black.
Some cool videos they posted online show how their current prototype (原型) can block out any television, and also most computers.
They created a Kickstarter campaign to raise money to produce them, and in three days it reached its goal of $ 25,000. The page has raised $ 11,000——with two more weeks of crowdfunding remaining.
Wearing the glasses in public for a few months has also raised people's interest. Scott gets stopped on the street because he modeled the glasses to look just like those in the 1988 sci-fi movie They Live, about a man who discovers a pair of glasses that can magically block out advertisements.
In an interview with WIRED, Scott says he hopes the product is also a conversation starter about how having news broadcasts everywhere affects our lives and how people want control over their exposure to technology.
Next, we think someone needs to develop technology that can block out only the bad news.
