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Just Wear Headphones

mattblodgett.com

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Re: Just Wear Headphones

#191

Post by Gonzih »

peterwwillis wrote: post #161
Gonzih wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm wearing earplugs from time to time (when music distracts me from really compex task for example). But if you think about it - it is so ridiculous. Why do I need to wear industrail grade ear protection in the office environment only to be able to do my job well?

You don't need to do anything. You could just put up with whatever noise distractions your office produces. If you don't want to do this, you can use ear protection to make it easier for you to deal with. But you certainly don't need to.

You don't really understand that for some people it's not just matter of distraction but actually completely out of their comfort zone?

Re: Just Wear Headphones

#192

Post by lurkinggrue »

geebee wrote: post #176

Is it time to get depressed yet? This has been a topic for such a long time. It was in people ware in 1987. I thought I discovered the topic when Joel (On Sofware) wrote about it in 2000. While a few people seem to enjoy open offices, the overwhelming majority of developers I know, or who chime in on HN, value a quiet place to work and dislike open offices. And yet, not only has nothing changed, it seems to be gettin…

I suggest perhaps a fetal position desk:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NYSxkqL9l_8

Re: Just Wear Headphones

#193

Post by lurkinggrue »

harryf wrote: post #9
AdamN wrote: post #2

I used to use construction 'headphones'. They do nothing but dampen outside noise - no music. It's a pretty good solution ... but a solution to a stupid problem because the right solution is more productive working conditions.

> the right solution is more productive working conditions Absolutely! To me what's most disturbing about "Just use headphones" is it's highly prevalent information-age companies but shows a deep _lack_ of understanding for the need for _focus_ and long periods of uninterrupted concentration essential for creative work.

Hell, why aren't you just using construction worker ear protection and a horse blinders?

Re: Just Wear Headphones

#194

Post by justonepost »

s73v3r wrote: post #106
justonepost wrote: post #14

WFH + Open plans are great and should generally be encouraged. The open plan facilitates communications and general discussion. I encourage my team to spend at least 3 days a week at work during our 'core' time (12-5pm/MWF). It gets a bit noisy and productivity drops a bit, but team morale is good and there is a lot of cross pollination of ideas and knowledge. The only difficulty I've had is nearby teams haven't adop…

How do open plan offices facilitate communicating if everyone is wearing headphones with music cracked up all day? And if you're promoting WFH, then pepper should be using something like email or chat, which means that open plan is unnecessary. And have you actually done any studies to prove that the cross pollination actually harkens, or does anything?

Wearing headphones while in the open space is antithesis to our team. No one does it. Random interruptions at work are expected and even encouraged. I have not done any studies at all except to privately ask the team during 1:1s if they like it, and they do. In this market where engineers are hard to keep, I prioritize morale over productivity.

Re: Just Wear Headphones

#195

Post by lurkinggrue »

binxbolling wrote: post #44
kqr wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also might matter that open floor plans make interacting with people convenient, and it's a large part of their job to interact with people. I really only need interaction with people for well under 10% of a normal work day. What makes perfect sense for their kind of works does not make as much sense for my kind of work.

For me it makes interacting with people even more inconvenient. Now instead of having a conversation with one person, I'm effectively having one with a dozen or more. So everyone's booking entire conference rooms just to talk 1:1—even if the topic is fairly benign or banal, nobody likes eavesdroppers.

Just love it when people comment on phone calls you just had.

I found myself having conversations with family members where I never mentioned words that would give away what I was talking about.

What drive me even crazier is co workers that took an almost insane interest in what I was eating for lunch.

Yeah, it's a fucking big mac... have you never seen one before?

Re: Just Wear Headphones

#197

Post by [deleted] »

lukev wrote: post #151
Symbiote wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it healthy to wear these every day? I have some Etymotic earplugs, which I use at nightclubs, gigs and concerts, but from the way they feel I don't think it would be good for my ears to use them daily.

Assuming you aren't actually pushing them in far enough to press against your eardrums, you're fine. The physical feeling you get is just pressure on your outer ear canal - it might be uncomfortable (though it shouldn't be, try a different size plug) but it won't lead to hearing loss. The kind of hearing loss that article is talking about is only caused by exposure to loud noise, and you're only going to be better of…

[deleted]

Re: Just Wear Headphones

#198

Post by Gonzih »

lurkinggrue wrote: post #195
binxbolling wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me it makes interacting with people even more inconvenient. Now instead of having a conversation with one person, I'm effectively having one with a dozen or more. So everyone's booking entire conference rooms just to talk 1:1—even if the topic is fairly benign or banal, nobody likes eavesdroppers.

Just love it when people comment on phone calls you just had. I found myself having conversations with family members where I never mentioned words that would give away what I was talking about. What drive me even crazier is co workers that took an almost insane interest in what I was eating for lunch. Yeah, it's a fucking big mac... have you never seen one before?

Why would you even pick up your phone without leaving the room or trying to find some quiet space? I'm trying to keep my private conversetations outside of my work environment, not because I don't want people to hear things, but because it can annoy/distract people around me.

Re: Just Wear Headphones

#199

Post by wiredfool »

drzaiusapelord wrote: post #54
kazinator wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Get a second opinion. Maybe they are trying to sell you on expensive hearing aids. It's also possible you didn't ever have great hearing. (Do you have any "before" audiogram to compare against, from when you were a child?)

Uh, seriously? Right now we have a huge public health issue with young people and hearing loss. It isn't some scam. Turns out the ipod/iphone revolution came with some external costs. http://learningenglish.voanews.com/content/one-billion-young... "If a person takes a subway to go from one place to the other for half an hour in the morning and a half an hour in the evening, and every day has to turn up the volume on…

It's not just the ipod revolution, it was happening in the walkman era, starting about the time sony came out with the little turbo headphones. (which then morphed into the earbuds)

The killer was the balance between bass and treble, the phones were plenty loud enough, they just had no bass response to speak of until the treble was loud enough to cause permanent hearing damage. Earbuds today might be a little better, but they're still fighting the physics.

I did damage to my hearing until I bought good headphones (Grado SR60. They were ~60 back in 1992, not much more than that now). They had more bass at 2 than the earbuds had at 9. There were a couple of tracks that demo'd the effect really well, where a drum or bass line just wasn't there in the little earphones.

Now, my hearing drops off above 12khz and below about 35. And it's much harder to hear things when there's other distracting noise going on. I can tell someone's talking, just not what they're saying. This is especially true when someone's yelling from another room over the not terribly loud music in my office. It's also really bad talking to someone on the phone, but I'm not sure how much of that is hearing loss and how much is crappy cell connections.

Re: Just Wear Headphones

#200

Post by kazinator »

MetaCosm wrote: post #84
mondoshawan wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How about both? Taking BART into SF for an hour every day, then wearing headphones the entire workday because of the open floor plan. I do this now -- pretty worried about my hearing...

Focus on noise isolation. Using ER-4P ( https://www.etymotic.com/consumer/earphones/er4.html ) with triple-flange tips is about the best you can get. Better even than $1000+ customs (exception made for Noble silicon customs).

One problem with $1000 ear plugs (and $1000 speaker cables, etc) is that some of the microphones used to record the music only cost a hundred bucks, and it passed through numerous 10 cent op-amp chips in various studio equipment.
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