The Gizmodo kids pulled a good stunt at CES: they fired TV-B-Gone remotes at walls of shiny new monitors on display and during press conferences, much to the displeasure of booth staffers.
No colors anymore.
(Credit: Gizmodo)The video is funny. The ramifications of prank will not be. The CES organizers only grudgingly gave bloggers press credentials to the conference, and even then kept them segregated into a working lounge that was a step down in amenity and luxury from the "press" lounge and work area. This prank will not endear the blogging class to either the CEA, which produces CES, or the companies that paid dearly for the right to occupy CES floorspace and show off their products.
I would not be surprised to see Gizmodo banned from the show and possibly sued by either the CEA or the companies its bloggers harassed. For journalists (in my mind, all bloggers are journalists), legal and constitutional protection does not extend to mischief or sabotage. Publishing news reports, opinion, and satire are protected acts. Physical interference is not.
I asked Gizmodo publisher Nick Denton if he was going to fire the Gizmodo crew for their prank. "No," is all he said in an instant message. He did not reply to followup questions.
Gizmodo added this apology after the post first ran, but I don't think it will mollify the victims.
It was too much fun, but watching this video, we realize it probably made some people's jobs harder, and I don't agree with that (Especially Motorola). We're sorry.
There are other likely outcomes of the prank. From now on, no one with an infrared-controlled device at a tradeshow is going to leave it exposed. A few tabs of black electrical tape will thwart TV-B-Gones. Beyond that, as our security expert Robert Vamosi said about this incident, expect TV manufacturers to think seriously about building encryption into their remote controls.
View complete CES 2008 coverage from CNET.
AUSTIN, TEXAS--I'm sitting in the lobby of the Radisson hotel downtown with a bunch of the folks putting on Maker Faire.
One of them is Make magazine editor Phil Torrone, who, among other crazy ventures, was the co-genius behind Roomba Frogger, when he and fellow hacker Limor Fried modified a Roomba vacuum cleaner and wirelessly directed it to run back and forth across an Austin street like the iconic classic video game during South by Southwest 2006.
This morning, however, Torrone is tired, as it's only 8 a.m. But he's got a goal, and it's not one that would be generally accepted by society at large.
'Make' magazine editor Phil Torrone holding the TV-B-Gone, an open-source kit for turning off televisions
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET News.com)And that is to show off his brand new TV-B-Gone kit, an open-source, build-it-yourself device for turning off almost any television created by Fried in conjunction with Mitch Altman, the designer of the original TV-B-Gone.
And while Altman sold his device, people couldn't build it themselves. Now, anyone can in about 20 minutes with some rudimentary soldering skills, Torrone tells me. This is much more in the spirit of Maker Faire and general DIY culture.
So, we're sitting in the lobby and Torrone shows me the device, which is small, with several LEDs and some circuitry. I would never have known what it is.
A big flat-screen TV on the wall is showing CNN and Torrone is bemoaning the fact that television tends to suck people's attention away from conversation. So he looks over at the set, surreptitiously pushes the button on his TV-B-Gone, and it flickers off.
We smile, because it's nice that it's off, but a minute later, someone walks over and turns it on again.
That's no good, clearly, and so Torrone clicks it off again using his tool.
Torrone turning off the television in the lobby of the Austin Radisson hotel using his TV-B-Gone kit. Someone turned it on a minute later, so Torrone turned it back off.
(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET News.com)"I feel really bad about this," Torrone says, "totally bad about that. I'm not a good person."
I don't believe him.
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