🚀 go-pugleaf

Keychain Remote Control Turns Off Most TVs
Inventor Mitch Altman holds up his new gadget, TV-B-Gone, on his
keychain in San Francisco, Tuesday, Oct. 19, 2004. The new keychain
gadget, which lets people turn off most TVs anywhere from airports to
restaurants, is selling at a faster clip than it would take most
people to surf the channels on their boob tubes. The keychain sells
for $14.99. 


Tuesday, October 19, 2004


SAN JOSE, Calif. - A lot of people love television but apparently some
people have had enough of it, too. A new keychain gadget that lets
people turn off most TVs - anywhere from airports to restaurants - is
selling at a faster clip than it would take most people to surf the
channels on their boob tubes. 

"I thought there would just be a trickle, but we are swamped," the
inventor, Mitch Altman of San Francisco, said Monday in an interview.
"I didn't know there were so many people who were into turning TV
off." 

Hundreds of orders for Altman's $14.99 TV-B-Gone gadget poured in
Monday after the tiny remote control was announced in Wired magazine
and other online media outlets. At times, the unexpected attention
overloaded and crashed the Web site of his company, Cornfield
Electronics. 

(http://www.cornfieldelectronics.com) (Placed by poster for your
convenence. However, they are out of stock, but next week, should be
ready to ship)

The keychain fob works like a universal remote control but one that
only turns TVs on or off. With a zap of a button, the gizmo goes
through a string of about 200 infrared codes that controls the power
of about 1,000 television models. Altman said the majority of TVs
should react within 17 seconds, though it takes a little more than a
minute for the gizmo to emit all the trigger codes. 

Altman, 47, first got the idea for TV-B-Gone a decade ago when he was
out with friends at a restaurant and they found themselves all glued
to the perched TV instead of talking to each other. No one was around
to turn the TV off. 

The self-described geek with a masters in electrical engineering
started tinkering full-time on the project a few years ago with help
from money he had earned from a company he co-founded, data-storage
maker 3ware Inc. 

Altman remembers spending most of his childhood unwittingly captivated
by TV, watching shows like "Gilligan's Island" and others, whether
they were entertaining or not. 

He quit as an adult and hasn't owned a television since 1980. 

He has tested the TV-B-Gone remote discreetly in many places,
including in other countries, and - with the exception of Hong Kong -
says he usually gets little to no reaction from others after the
background TV noise and glare disappears. 

But he said he would never dare silently kill the machines in places
like sports bars, where patrons expect TVs to be on. 

"I can be mischievous, but I'm not going to do anything malicious, and
I don't want to make anyone's life more difficult," Altman said. "I
just don't like TV, and I'd like people to think more about this
powerful medium in their lives." 

Altman does not contend that all TV is bad. "There's just so little
time in all of our lives," he said. "Why should we spend so much time
on something we don't necessarily enjoy?" 

So beware: Next time you're at a Laundromat or restaurant, the blaring
TV might just mysteriously turn off!