Listening to podcasts/news/music with machines

[Matt Day]

So I know that there are ear muffs that play music for working in a loud shop and all, but that's not what I really want.

I generally have my phone plugged into my old stereo in the shop playing a podcast or the news. The kind of thing that you need to listen to the whole thing and can't miss 30 seconds to joint a board, use the router, etc. So I feel like I'm constantly pausing, using a machine, unpause, machine, pause again, etc. Not a big deal but kind of annoying and I think there must be a better way.

Is there any kind of noise sensing app that can pause music/podcast/etc until the noise is done? I'm envisioning the kind of things that automatically turn on your DC when a tool is started. I don't like wearing ear muffs unless using a machine so that's not really an option to me.

Any other suggestions?

[Jim Koepke]

Any other suggestions?

Have you ever paid a visit to the Neanderthal Haven?

Hand tools don't make as much noise.

jtk

[Chuck Wintle]

So I know that there are ear muffs that play music for working in a loud shop and all, but that's not what I really want.

I generally have my phone plugged into my old stereo in the shop playing a podcast or the news. The kind of thing that you need to listen to the whole thing and can't miss 30 seconds to joint a board, use the router, etc. So I feel like I'm constantly pausing, using a machine, unpause, machine, pause again, etc. Not a big deal but kind of annoying and I think there must be a better way.

Is there any kind of noise sensing app that can pause music/podcast/etc until the noise is done? I'm envisioning the kind of things that automatically turn on your DC when a tool is started. I don't like wearing ear muffs unless using a machine so that's not really an option to me.

Any other suggestions?
They do make noise canceling headphones and apparently they work well. But a bit pricey in the $300 range.

[Barry McFadden]

There IS a better way....I don't listen to any music or podcasts while I'm woodworking...prefer to concentrate on what I'm doing.....

[Brian Henderson]

There IS a better way....I don't listen to any music or podcasts while I'm woodworking...prefer to concentrate on what I'm doing.....

Exactly. Any distraction is a potentially hazardous distraction, especially when working with power tools. If you're doing a glue-up, fine, but that's not noisy. If there's too much noise in the shop to hear the podcast, it's probably too dangerous to be listening to it in the first place.

[Matt Day]

I think you guys misunderstood what I'm getting at. I want the music/podcast to PAUSE when I'm using a machine and start again when the machine is off.

Stand down safety police.

[Aaron Conway]

I don't know about an auto sensing app but I use Sonos (http://www.sonos.com) in my shop, and all over my house, and can play any streaming music, podcast, radio station, etc. You can either use their app on your phone to play/pause or press the button on top of the speaker.

Cheers,

Aaron

[Allan Dozier]

That would be very handy for podcasts Matt. If there was a commercially available unit that would do that I would buy it. I'm sure an electronics guru could come up with something but that would be too much trouble for me. One problem I could foresee would be some way to keep a louder than usual output causing it to pause itself.

[Matt Day]

Allan, I thought about that too. Like dropping something or getting yelled at by SWMBO. But if it was programmed to require say 2 seconds of noise above a set decibel, that would solve it. Being able to control the set decibel would be nice too.

My wife said there probably isn't a big market for this, which I agree, but it would be pretty simple I think to create an app like this.

[Yonak Hawkins]

I don't know of anything that will automatically cause the transmission to pause from an audio sensor. Also, I'm not sure if pushing the play/pause button on a good pair of Bluetooth headphones would work for you, but it might. I wear a pair of over-the-ear headphones most of the time in the shop and I can hear the broadcast or music no matter how loud the ambient noise is.

[John Goodin]

I haven't heard of anything but typically listen to music or npr, at a low volume to think clearly, when a lot of processes will make noise. I don't care if I miss a part of a song. Quiet activities like finishing and hand sanding I' ll listen to a podcast. Seems like I listen to music at the beginning of projects and podcasts at the end.

[Allan Dozier]

Matt, some misunderstood what you are desiring but as a podcast fan I do. My ideal situation would be to dock my iphone (which contains a few hundred hours of podcasts) onto an amplifier and speaker system and then pause when loud machines start up. It would probably be easy for someone to make a microphone apparatus that would turn off the power to the amplifier temporarily but that wouldn't help. It needs to pause the iphone at that point in the broadcast and then start it back. After you get your patent for this let me know and I will be your first customer!

[Steven Fowler]

The best I can think of for you is something like amazon echo that listens to voice commands. I haven't heard of any ambient sound sensing apps but wouldn't that difficult at all based on the fact they already have apps like google now that are always listening for commands. Depending on your phone if you have android tasker they might have something along the lines of that already. (Just looked, paired with audio voice you can send custom commands to your phone).

[Duane Meadows]

Just a thought off the top of my head, but... the app used to listen to the podcast or whatever would have to be compatible. Muting audio totally, probably fairly easy. Pausing another app, maybe not so much. But , hey, I have been wrong before!