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Music to my brother’s ears
Why (and how) we created new audio products
for hearing impaired persons
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Company Confidential Bowen Innovation Consultants, Ltd. © 2009
Introduction
Prepared for
Positive Lifestyles Panel (Friesen Conference
23 April 2009)
By
Morley Lipsett (semi-retired)
SFU Centre for Policy Research on Science and Technology
and
Earl Lipsett (retired musician/educator)
With inspiration from
Naftaly Ramrajkar (Product developer, audiophile & sage)
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My brother
(and his ears)
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Predicament
& the germ of an idea
• My visit to Edmonton
• Aging ears – and in a
hospital
• What, no iPod?
• How hearing loss became a
virtue
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My ‘cool’ gear
(on the plane)
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Meanwhile at the hospital
 Physical discomfort
 No tv
 No CDs
 No audio-visual enjoyment
available
 My iPod unsuited to Earl’s
ears, with or without
hearing aid.
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So I went shopping
for a remedy.
–None existed!
And this begins our story -
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Disconnects
Hearing aid culture
iPod culture
 Invisibility
 Cool
 Low power/tiny battery
 Visible & fashionable
 Not mp3-friendly
 Superb sound quality for
 Limited dynamic range
tiny transducers
low voltage
‘normal hearing’
 Music, music, music
 Trendy earphones
 Annoying to wear; easy to
But
misplace
 Associated with ageism
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 neglects personal
hearing deficits
Company Confidential - Bowen Innovation Consultants, Ltd. © 2009
Not enjoyed (yet)
by persons with hearing loss
Such as
 Rock Musicians
 Age related (Boomers)
 Pilots
 Occupational damage
 Slow degradation over
In fact
 Most people don’t
know what they’ve
been missing
 They just gradually got
used to
time
Most everyone,
sooner or later
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Company Confidential - Bowen Innovation Consultants, Ltd. © 2009
 less brilliance
 lack of localization
 reduced clarity
 muffled sounds
Hearing acuity
 Often assumed
 Not normally measured until deafness is suspected
Frequently a matter of opinion
rather than accurately assessed.
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Company Confidential - Bowen Innovation Consultants, Ltd. © 2009
Yet audiograms are like eye exams
 Person with ‘normal’
hearing
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 Person with hearing
loss
Company Confidential - Bowen Innovation Consultants, Ltd. © 2009
So we set out
 To match the sounds of the world
 To Earl’s hearing spectrum
By using musician-quality
equipment.
(i.e. audiophile, hi-fidelity, studioquality stuff)
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Company Confidential - Bowen Innovation Consultants, Ltd. © 2009
Technical objectives
 Restore audiophile listening experience
i.e. beyond today’s youth
 For recorded performances
and
 Live events
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Company Confidential - Bowen Innovation Consultants, Ltd. © 2009
How we did it (eventually)
 Implementation
1.
Developed a special,
prototype interface
device to precisely
compensate
(SpectraPhonics
Normalizer technology)
2.
Fed studio quality
earphones/headphones
(as used by artists and
audiophiles)
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Company Confidential - Bowen Innovation Consultants, Ltd. © 2009
Obvious, perhaps, but unavailable
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Company Confidential - Bowen Innovation Consultants, Ltd. © 2009
Demo
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Company Confidential - Bowen Innovation Consultants,
Ltd. (c) 2009
We got it to work!
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Company Confidential - Bowen Innovation Consultants,
Ltd. (c) 2009
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Company Confidential - Bowen Innovation Consultants,
Ltd. (c) 2009
Resulting experience (field trials)
 Like putting on glasses and seeing clearly - again.
 20/20 listening
 Thrilling!
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Company Confidential - Bowen Innovation Consultants, Ltd. © 2009
Technology & Gerontology
 Today’s media - MP3/Video players, video games,
downloaded content, and live performances rely
on hearing.
 Yet hearing profile (loss) has been and continues
to be neglected by these markets
 Except for hearing aids
 Which are marketed as if for the infirm, the old, the defective.
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Company Confidential - Bowen Innovation Consultants, Ltd. (c) 2009
Our ‘positive lifestyles’ vision
 to make it cool
to be custom fitted for ‘ear glasses’.
 Let’s enjoy 20/20 listening;
Let’s redefine ‘normal’!
Any questions?
Does anybody here care to get involved in this work?
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