Wireless music sharing, but what's the point?
Magic black box sends wire-free music to paired headsets
Thanko, everyone's favourite purveyor of nonsense products, has finally come up with something that actually appears to have a purpose. Problem is, it's just not a very good purpose.
The i2i Stream costs ¥14,800 (£70) and consists of a pair of black boxes that connect wirelessly (on 2.4GHz) to each other to facilitate music sharing from a single source.
Cheapo option
One box needs to be connected to headphones on one end and an audio player on the other, before being paired with the other box, which has just a single set of headphones dangling from it.
The idea is that the poor sod who can afford just a pair of headphones, but no music player, can now soak up the wonders of someone else's iPod at a range of up to 10 metres.
Better yet, each sending device can pipe music to up to five of the receivers at a time, making for a very creepy party that can rock on for the duration of the five-hour battery life.
Perhaps the fact that the i2i Stream is imported and isn't actually a Thanko creation accounts for its lack of weirdness, but we're still wondering why anyone would want one.
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J Mark Lytle was an International Editor for TechRadar, based out of Tokyo, who now works as a Script Editor, Consultant at NHK, the Japan Broadcasting Corporation. Writer, multi-platform journalist, all-round editorial and PR consultant with many years' experience as a professional writer, their bylines include CNN, Snap Media and IDG.