Hold private phone conversations in public with this dumb invention

The open office floorplan is a disaster. It began as a Silicon Valley experiment to put everyone in the same huge room to spark collaboration and creativity. But that presupposes that every employee likes that environment or can thrive in it. Some tasks require concentration, which is harder to come by when your neighbor is having a rad brainstorm sesh just a few inches from your ears.

And what happens when all your coworkers have to jump on the phone? That’s where BloxVox comes in.

What is BloxVox?

See that incredibly stupid thing the man is wearing in the photo above? It’s a device intended to muffle the sound of your voice so your colleagues can’t hear, while the microphone from your headset slips inside, allowing the person on the other end of the call to hear clearly.

Sound stupid? It is!

Watch this thing in action:

Perhaps the BloxVox creators have a point, after all. Sometimes, you need to make a phone call and it’s better not to broadcast your end of the convo to the rest of the office or coffee shop or train car.

And sure, you might need to look like Bane to pull that off, but what’s the harm in that"lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter size-large" src="https://ksr-ugc.imgix.net/assets/020/878/750/d8b30b4f9cec354f304b434d6bffb979_original.gif?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&w=680&fit=max&v=1523643258&auto=format&gif-q=50&q=92&s=d19f21d80b4ce2d61589879cef6efd24" width="400" height="400" />

Let’s see how the Kickstarter community welcomed this invention…

Oh.

To its credit, one Kickstarter backer spent at least $875 to get the 25-pack. And it looks like BloxVox is still holding out hope of world domination. On the BloxVox website, they offer the opportunity to create custom units for corporate clients.

So you and your fellow Starbucks baristas could walk around with a Starbucks-branded muzzle on your face, talking about how badly you need a new job. Seems like a perfect solution.

It’s possible that BloxVox was a case of the perfect product at the imperfect time. After all, its design presupposes that you have headphones with a microphone on the cord. And then Apple dropped its AirPods on everyone, completely destroying any BloxVox compatibility. Or maybe people just don’t want to walk around like horses wearing feedbags.

Thoughts and prayers to the BloxVox team for their failed attempt at whatever that was.