Earbud Yo-Yo: the year's silliest gadget?
Gizmo that 'organises the earbuds you already own' to debut at CES
What keeps you up at night? Worrying about global warming? Working that second job to fight the economic downturn? Or perhaps it's untangling the cord of MP3 player earbuds?
If so, then Covington Creations has the product for you. The Earbud Yo-Yo, due to be unveiled at CES in a couple of weeks' time, promises to 'organise the earbuds you already own'.
Presumably because you're unlikely to pay for anything that organised earbuds belonging to someone else.
Move over Leonardo, Franklin, Dyson and Bayliss, Barkley is here!
The Earbud Yo-Yo is an audio cable organizer "invented" by Julie Johnson Barkley to organize the earbuds supplied with iPods, MP3 players and smart phones.
When asked about her "invention" she said, "Earbuds are wonderful audio accessories that are absolutely essential [!!!] to listen to music or to view movies, but everyone knows the earbuds are difficult to stow when not in use because they tangle easily." It is this tangling and untangling process that frustrated Julie to the point where she was motivated to find a solution.
And thank goodness she did. Here at TechRadar, we have one huge storeroom dedicated entirely to unruly and twisted audio cables, and we've been at a lost how to solve such an intractable problem.
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Note: the Earbud Yo-Yo is not actually a yo-yo, has no entertainment value and is a basically just a small plastic spindle. Pricing has yet to be confirmed but whatever it is, it's too much.
Mark Harris is Senior Research Director at Gartner.