Ok, so this is sort of a cheat, but I today I finally documented a prototype I made a while back. It’s called the Discommunicator. It’s a tool for communication that blocks conversation. It buffers words and enforces eye contact.
Intended for heated discourse, the Discommunicator allows each person to say all the things outloud that shouldn’t actually be heard by the other person. The device is such that the two users are forced to look at each other so they are aware of the emphatic nature of what is being said, but the specific words are absorbed by the solid form they are being spoken into.
For future prototypes, I’d like to make something a bit softer that also covers the ears so that it becomes a more immersive experience. This is one in a upcoming series of “limited communication devices”.
