Inspired by this thread.
I could have sworn when I was in highschool (y’know, like 25 thousand years ago) you could order a bag of like 50 3.5mm audio jack plugs but with no wire or connection after the plug. I’m searching for these now, but the closest I’m seeing are legit components designed to be an adaptor or connect to a wire.
It was just a 3.5mm audio plug with matte black plastic cap on the end, so you’d plug it into a TV’s headphone jack and some models of TVs would be permanently silenced until someone unplugged the cap, because it was sending its audio to the ‘speakers’ that were just plugged in. And once plugged in, it just looked like a screw cover cap - nothing protruding. But also didn’t damage anything, so you couldn’t get in any real trouble for doing it.
Shoddy photoshop to illustrate the gist:
…am I just imagining shit? If anyone knows what I’m talking about and figure out the magic search terms to actually pull it up, please drop a link to a product that can be ordered.
Anyway, the TV in my work’s breakroom is one of the culprits, so I’d love to hit it with one of these and see how long it takes for them to figure out why it won’t vomit out the misinformation they’re addicted to.
Audio jack sabotage aside, any suggestions on how to otherwise fuck with it would also be golden.
Thanks all!
I used to have a little gizmo that would transmit the turn off signal for a large range of tvs. It was the size of a car key fob. I tried it once in my company cafeteria that had a tv that was set way too loud and this woman would always come in and blast soap operas when I was trying to relax. I usually just sucked it up but this time I tried my device from about 20 ft away and the tv turned off. I made sure I looked innocent. She looked confused but turned it back on. lol
The TV-b-gone.
Was fun to turn off various advertising.
Would transmit 50-100 known IR-off-codes from a range of TV manufacturers.
I had a phone that did that! The feature was called ‘IR Blaster’ IIRC, and there was an app that had all the frequencies for different brands of TV on it. I don’t think they put those in smart phones anymore lol
For me I feel like the real move with one of these is to have it rapidly increase the volume instead of turning off the TV because it will probably make the person who is playing it loud feel like people think it is them who is turning it up that much intentionally.
In most cases I think this would mortify them, leading them to turn it back down further than it was originally, or even turn it off themselves since they don’t want to be seen as an asshole and don’t want the attention on them.
Subconsciously I would also think this would prevent them from turning it up again in the future.
Depends on the person though.
TV-B-Gone is the device you need
This is the way… You can build one with an ESP dev board and a couple of components. M5 stack has a couple of different ones that already come with IR and the firmware is pretty easy to download and install.
Get an IR blaster and just turn them off.
I know exactly what you’re talking about. I had a few of them many years ago while in college. At the time, people would use them to make sure their laptops wouldn’t make sounds when turning them on during class. I’ll post an update if I find them.
Might be a good opportunity to justify buying a Flipper Zero.
I feel like it’s only a matter of time before those get banned, so i kinda want to get one, even though I dont really need one.
Same here, but I also want to try and figure out how to get one anonymously. I’m not up to anything, I just want to play around with it, but I also don’t want to end up on some list if and when they do get banned.
Good thing is there is no law restricting tv remotes. It isn’t like emergency calls will be blocked if you turn a tv off.
Just get a standard issue universal remoteb with a self-synching feature.
Try “3.5mm dust plug”.
They should disconnect the speaker if the socket is the type when the plug physically pushes a connection apart.
I think that phones may handle it all electronically.
I remember coming across the thing you’re describing years ago while digging through my dad’s collection of miscellaneous cables, adapters, etc. back in the 90s or early 2000s. It wasn’t quite so low-profile, it definitely stuck out from whatever you plugged it into maybe about a quarter to half inch or so, but otherwise it was a 3.5mm jack with a plastic cap on the other with no wires or holes or anything that muted whatever you plugged it into.
The shade of beige the plastic was on that particular example makes me suspect it was a relic of the 80s. I do feel like I remember seeing them for sale somewhere at a later time, but I couldn’t begin to tell you where.
A little googling turned up this eBay listing
Based off of that and a little more googling I think the term you’re looking for might be a shorting and/or blanking plug or or cap or dummy/dummy plug
Without too much effort I was able to find “shorting caps” for RCA jacks, various coaxial connectors, and banana plugs, but had no luck finding any more for 3.5mm
If you buy the one in the image in the post, the metal part screws off from the plastic frame. You could then bend or brake the tab used to solder the cable to the connector (it’s thin) and you would have something closer to the right side image.
Can’t say I’ve ever seen anything like this and don’t see how it could be much of a viable product but you could just cut the cord off any headphone jack and plug it in (not sure how many tvs come with headphone jacks either) to achieve the same goal or get a phone with an IR blaster like another commenter suggested.
I did some looking around and found a product called Mic-Lock which can do what you described, but it’s not quite as small as you wanted.
If you are willing to get your hands dirty, you could buy TRS connectors and solder 8 ohm resistors from each channel to ground. Might have to shave down the pins and print some caps for them.
I see some end in a thin pin or are short. I was thinking of the ones that are the full size of a plug, of course.
