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It's funny. Laugh. Toys Hardware

When the Alarm Clock Runs and Hides 212

Posted by kdawson from the run-in-circles-scream-and-shout dept.
bbbbryan writes to tell us about the commercialization of the elusive alarm clock prototyped at the MIT Media Lab a couple of years back. This alarm clock actually runs, hides from you, and beeps to ensure that you'll be awake enough not to go back to sleep by the time you find it and get it shut up. Detroit News has a writeup on the device, which you can buy from the inventor's site for $50.
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When the Alarm Clock Runs and Hides More

When the Alarm Clock Runs and Hides

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  • Some youtube of the clock in action (Score:5, Informative)

    by adamstew ( 909658 ) * on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @01:36AM (#18763831)
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DvNGnkY_S6I [youtube.com]

    Enjoy!

    • Re:Some youtube of the clock in action (Score:5, Funny)

      by kestasjk ( 933987 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @02:51AM (#18764339) Homepage
      So you wake up, groggily stumble out of bed and tread on your alarm clock, which is basically a half-roller-skate, you slip and your forehead smashes your china lamp...

      Coffee for me I think. (ahahar)

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by ozbon ( 99708 )
      Ah, I have a hack to stop this happening.

      Stand the thing on it's end, rather than on the wheels. It might spin round, but it isn't going anywhere.
      Hell, you could even just trap it between two books. Or have I missed the point? *grin*

    • US & Canada only (Score:2, Interesting)

      by funkdancer ( 582069 )
      "which you can buy from the inventor's site for $50."
      But only if you live in the US or Canada.

      Any Australian resellers?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by interiot ( 50685 )
      Here's a video [chalmers.se] of a human-sized vehicle that operates on the same principle, generally called a dicycle/diwheel. If it accelerates or brakes too hard, it just flips over, with no harm done. (though the alarm clock seems to do more flipping than actual moving... does it have any sort of sense of how much forward momentum it's got?)

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by pikine ( 771084 )
      The clock likes to crawl under the bed. It is annoying, even when you're awake, to have to duck under your bed in order to reach for the clock. Imagine the pain for a queen or king sized bed!

  • shock (Score:5, Funny)

    by Lehk228 ( 705449 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @01:37AM (#18763841) Journal
    wouldn't it be cheaper to wire a capacitor to your snooze button?

    • For that matter... (Score:2, Flamebait)

      by Moraelin ( 679338 )
      For that matter, if anyone has that much trouble getting up, wouldn't it be more productive to actually go to bed some 8 hours before having to get up? I dunno, just a crazy idea.

      And, much as I'm a gamer myself, the excuse better not be, "but my guild needed me for a raid" ;)

      • For that matter, if anyone has that much trouble getting up, wouldn't it be more productive to actually go to bed some 8 hours before having to get up? I dunno, just a crazy idea.
        Spoken like a morning person. Trust me, not everyone is like you.

        • Spoken like a morning person. Trust me, not everyone is like you.

          Heh. Not really. I've been called many names, but "morning person" is pretty far off the mark. My ideal day would involve working at night and sleeping from 6 AM to 2 PM. But, alas, you can't always have a pony.

          What it has to do with, is, well, discipline and accepting your fate. If I must wake up at a given time, you know, I must. I might as well accept that and go get a cup of cofee. It takes less time than playing silly chase-the-clock game

          • Plus, there's this little detail that there is no such thing as a biological "morning person".

            Hmm... how about this [bbc.co.uk]?

            The real lesson is that people do differ in their characteristics and predisposition, and extrapolating from your own experience is often much less reliable than you might imagine. "Discipline and accepting your fate" is very Protestant and all that, but it doesn't necessarily alter your biological responses. Your simple prescription of just going to sleep 8 hours before you need to wake up

            • Well, heh, at least it's good to know I'd make a good Protestant, if I ever decide to become religious :P
      • What happens when it takes you four hours to get to sleep? This clock wouldn't work in my room anyway, it wouldn't get two inches before running into a heap of discarded clothes, furniture, or the mountain of empty beer cans.

    • Re:shock (Score:5, Funny)

      by z0idberg ( 888892 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @02:28AM (#18764223)
      Sort of similar theme, I like this one. [engadget.com]
      You have to diffuse the bomb to stop the alarm. Gets your brain woring so (hopefully) you are wide awake by the time you turn it off and dont go back to sleep. I can't see this one surviving a bad hangover though.

    • I claim prior art (Score:5, Funny)

      by JonTurner ( 178845 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @03:43AM (#18764613) Journal
      >>This alarm clock actually runs, hides from you, and beeps to ensure that you'll be awake enough not to go back to sleep by the time you find it and get it shut up.

      Also known as kids. Though mine tend to scream rather than beep.

    • Re:shock (Score:5, Funny)

      by jeff4747 ( 256583 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @07:19AM (#18765657)

      wouldn't it be cheaper to wire a capacitor to your snooze button?

      You'd be surprised what a 'night person' is willing to sleep through. Electric shock? No problem. Much less painful than waking up before noon.

    • wouldn't it be cheaper to wire a capacitor to your snooze button?

      run high enough voltage thru it - then it would be a capacitator.

  • Second Amendment (Score:5, Funny)

    by Philotic ( 957984 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @01:37AM (#18763855)
    A very valid reason for preserving the second amendment.
  • It sounds like the one from 12:01 [imdb.com], which moves and insults the user at the same time.

  • $50 per use will get expensive (Score:5, Funny)

    by EmbeddedJanitor ( 597831 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @01:38AM (#18763867)
    When you catch the friggin thing you will smash it to hell, so you'll need to buy a new one for the next use. Damn expensive!

    Rather make one out of Lego Mindstorms. At lest then when you smash it, it only de-bricks and you can build it back together again!

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by Whiney Mac Fanboy ( 963289 ) *
      I think the tennis ball alarm clockis a little more practical [tennisgifts.com] then a self-reconstructing robot.

      It's an alarm inside a tennis ball - you throw it against the wall to turn it off. I think tho' that it would be more useful if the throw activated snooze - as described here [freepatentsonline.com]:

      An alarm clock in the form of a sports ball has an alarm clock assembly with a snooze-type audio alarm which is temporarily silenced when the ball is thrown against a wall. The alarm clock ball has a feasible and resilient core of a foamed pl

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by ozbon ( 99708 )
        I had one of those a few years ago, and it worked out damn' expensive too - I threw it through a (closed) window. Ooops.

        The alarm didn't survive either...

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by asninn ( 1071320 )

      When you catch the friggin thing you will smash it to hell, so you'll need to buy a new one for the next use. Damn expensive!

      Sounds like a great business model that ensures a steady revenue stream for the manufacturer. :)

  • Would be only a matter of time.. (Score:5, Funny)

    by priestx ( 822223 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @01:41AM (#18763883) Homepage
    before I punt that motherf**ker out the window.

  • Sounds like... (Score:5, Funny)

    by _Hellfire_ ( 170113 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @01:43AM (#18763889)
    MMS' sentient alarm clock.

    I was in a bar in Ensenada, drinking a warm beer quickly and trying to remind myself that I hadn't murdered anyone, when my alarm clock caught up with me. Little bastard.

    More [randomhouse.com]

  • Why make it so difficult... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Kjella ( 173770 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @01:43AM (#18763901) Homepage
    I have an alarm clock for when I really really need to get up. There's no going back to sleep afterwards because you're either in cardiac arrest or wide awake, it lacks any concept of gentle wake-up and is only slightly less annoying than the smoke detector. To avoid the former I use my regular cell phone first, so I'm only slumbering or in light sleep when it goes off.
    • I'm glad you don't have trouble getting up. I on the other hand have a very hard time. Between two jobs, going to college full time, and a natural sleep schedule of 6am-3pm I don't get a lot of sleep, so when I go to sleep I *really* don't want to get up in the morning. That's not to say my alarms (7 of them sequentially) don't wake me up. I'm just really good at hitting snooze at the first hint of that familiar sound (I use music to wake me up, blaring alarms are less effective). Once I grow accustom to th
      • That's exactly how I am. There's no such thing as a snooze bar I can't hit in my sleep. I have 3 alarms, all out of reach from my bed, and each on a separate wall of my room. They're staggered to go off every 3 minutes. The instant one goes off, I jump out of bed, hit snooze (or sometimes actually turn it off completely), and get back in bed. I don't realize I'm doing this, but I do it almost every day. I've tried putting my alarms in hard to get into boxes, but that doesn't work either. In high school, I o

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by NickFitz ( 5849 )

          That box business sounds like the kind of thing I'd do. I once had a girlfirend who, while I was sleeping, tied the alarm clock (big brass thing with bells on top) over my head, suspended from the light cord, too high to reach without standing on the bed. By the time I'd finished hurling myself around the room to all the usual places while still 90% asleep, and finally been forced to wake up enough to work out what she'd done, she was laughing so loud I couldn't have got back to sleep anyway :-)

      • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

        by pikine ( 771084 )

        A number of years ago, I wrote a BASIC alarm clock program, running on DOS, that would only shut off if I answer a multiplication problem correctly, and these are two digit by two digit problems. Nowadays a program like that doesn't work because there are simpler ways to shut it off:

        • Most computer speakers are now amplified. They have an on/off switch and a volume control. You can also mute the sound card much more easily nowadays. My old speakers were not amplified---you have to yank it off---and my prog

    • Re:Why make it so difficult... (Score:5, Funny)

      by Lumpy ( 12016 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @07:55AM (#18765947) Homepage
      My 15 year old stepson (who is now 23) had problems waking. so I built him an alarmclock that is very much like the one spongebob has.

      I wired a foundry alarm klaxon to it. 115DB of unmuteable BRAAAAAAAAAAAAAPBT! the alarm clock was mounted to the wall across the room and had only 1 big red emergency shutdown button. if he did not get out of bed to his alarm and go over and press that button it went off.

      The alarm went off only about 6 times before he was up in the morning on a regular basis. He took the alarm with him to college last time back. his response,"I have a pair of roommates that are incredibly lazy and will not get out of bed, so I always end up late to class as we car-pool."

      I mentioned it was his car, he grinned and said, "No, this will do fine."

      if you get the frequency low enough and loud enough there is not enough pillows to mute the sound to an acceptable level.

  • cat (Score:5, Funny)

    by rahimobius ( 1087399 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @01:49AM (#18763939)
    This might be more practical than strapping my alarmclock to my cat.
    • Why not your breakfast? [scalzi.com]
    • Oh great, just what we need. Cats with fricking alarm clocks on their heads.

      Granted, somewhat less effective than sharks with fricking laser beams, but they'll do in a pinch.

  • Prank Alarm Clock (Score:5, Funny)

    by blurryrunner ( 524305 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @01:55AM (#18763981) Homepage
    A combination of this idea could be combined with a prank a friend of mine pulled not too long ago.

    He was studying computer engineering and doing stuff with embedded devices. He took a chip, a light sensor, and a small speaker and hid it in the room of one of his roommates. He programmed the device to sense when the lights went out and then it would sound off at full volume. The device would continue to sound until the lights came back on, at which time it would go silent. After the lights went out again, the timer would reset and the alarm would go off in another ten minutes...

    -br

    • Re:Prank Alarm Clock (Score:5, Funny)

      by Asmandeus ( 640419 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @03:06AM (#18764419)
      And behold, at this time did mankind finally solve the ages old question of what exactly drives man to murder another.

      So it was written.

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by KokorHekkus ( 986906 )
      Kudos to your friend for a masterful prank!

      Now, I have a bit of a mean streak so I would like to suggest the following modification: instead of a fixed inteval it should be random, say between 5 - 20 minutes, coupled to how fast the pranked person responds... just to throw him of her off their rocks a bit. And finally... there shouldn't be a full volume alarm... I think a combination of gentle coughs or throat clearing sounds would be most effective.

      Of course this is not recommended for US citizens un

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by smellsofbikes ( 890263 )
      I have several friends that spend a lot of time, when visiting (or I spend the time, when visiting them) hiding small alarm/timers in unexpected places, set for 2 AM. One of the best, so far, has been in a baggie in the toilet tank, although I'm pretty fond of taking off a heater vent grille and chucking it back in there and then putting the grille back together. That took one of my friends *forever* to recover, and plus you could hear it in multiple rooms.

    • Re:Prank Alarm Clock (Score:5, Funny)

      by Frumious Wombat ( 845680 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @10:03AM (#18767685)
      A modern, refined, version of the old flashbulb gag. Classic press-camera bulbs had standard screw-in bases like a normal lightbulb, but were filled with magnesium ribbon. So, you just go into someone's room/office (such as your sleeping roomie), unscrew the conventional bulbs, and put one of those suckers in. They wake up, flip the light switch, and it looks like a nuke went off in the room, after which it's mercifully dark so you can make your get-away. Someone should combine these two pranks, then report back.

      Note: one of you. I'm older, married, and when married you discover that practical jokes on the roomie have different consequences than when in college.

  • nice, but... (Score:4, Informative)

    by cyborch ( 524661 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @01:55AM (#18763989) Homepage Journal

    Similar ideas [gadgets.dk] have been in production for a while...

    A flying alarm clock accomplishes the same task, plus: IT'S FLYING

  • WOOHOO!!! (Score:3, Funny)

    by evilviper ( 135110 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @01:59AM (#18764023) Journal
    I CAN'T WAIT to buy a bunch of these things, and modify them!

    Can you imagine the mischief potential?!

    Modify it so it goes at high speed, and NEVER STOPS moving...

    I can't wait to unleash a bunch of these annoying little bastards in the nearest shopping mall!
  • This thing had better be mallot-proof and bullet-proof, cause...damn.

  • Flame Fest. (Score:4, Interesting)

    by femto ( 459605 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @02:19AM (#18764181) Homepage
    How long before, like the flaming mouse [abc.net.au], one of these knocks a candle over or runs into a fireplace, and burns a house down?

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by X-treme-LLama ( 178013 )
      I don't know about you, but I blow my candles OUT when I go to sleep. What the hell are you doing burning candles over-night or when you're not somewhere near the area?

      If it happens to someone, it's their own damn fault.

      Going to sleep with candles lit.. That's just asking to get crispy-baked in a fire..

      NEVER LEAVE FIRE UNATTENDED! Fucking DUH!

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by asninn ( 1071320 )
      Do you usually have lit candles or a lit fireplace in the room when you're asleep? I don't.

  • Runs and hides...? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Demerara ( 256642 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @02:31AM (#18764241) Homepage
    ...falls off the bedside locker and rolls about aimlessly more like.

    This being /. I was expecting some real smart features such as:

    o Learns the layout of your bedroom

    o Jumps off the locker before it goes off

    o Hides in the optimum place

    o Doesn't hide in the same place twice

    o Has a proximity sensor - runs away as you try to pick it up.

    Based on the Yew-Toob clips, I reckon this gadget would last about 5 minuted in my house. It's simply too easy to hit with a stick.

    • Re:Runs and hides...? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by retro128 ( 318602 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @03:03AM (#18764405)
      You noticed that too, eh? The thing does spend an inordinate amount of time repeatedly bumping into walls. That thing wouldn't get far in my house either. It'd just get caught on all the clothes on the floor and I'd end up stepping on it. I'll stick with my usual MO. Hit the snooze for 40 minutes and get up 10 minutes before I'm supposed to leave for work, take 10 minutes to get ready and somehow show up 15 minutes late. The boss once called me on it. I replied "Well, OK I can show up on time, but I'll leave at 5 sharp like everyone else around here.". Never heard about it again.

      IT has its perks. I doubt I could be such a slovenly bastard in any other position.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by hellfire ( 86129 )
        The boss once called me on it. I replied "Well, OK I can show up on time, but I'll leave at 5 sharp like everyone else around here.". Never heard about it again.

        Off-Topic, but this is what sucks about my position. If I try to use this excuse, my boss will say "I don't care, this position is scheduled, you are supposed to leave at 5, which means you have to show up at 8 sharp."

        Then again, I don't have to do much overtime, and I get paid by the hour, so I really can't complain. It's just the snooze button f
    • A normal alarm clock will fulfill your requirements with one small mod: attach it to a cat.
  • Looking at those little wheels, I'm not sure that it could get very far to hide in my house.

    Which is the very reason I don't need to spend $50 TO lose something, when I seem to be doing a damn fine job myself.

  • Great if you have a totally tidy room (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Paul Crowley ( 837 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @03:10AM (#18764445) Homepage Journal
    In our room it would fall straight into a pile of clothing and stay there. This will be great for the sorts of people who have a hard time getting up but somehow manage to keep their bedrooms 100% tidy, but I suspect that the intersection of those two sets is small.

  • Cool (Score:5, Funny)

    by iminplaya ( 723125 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @03:20AM (#18764499) Journal
    A Segway for my parakeet.
  • does that thing come back to where it belongs after I am awake or do I have to find it everyday to put it back on the nightstand? In other words: does this thing more than any wind-up toy would be capable of?

    Just asking.

  • The 0$ alternative (Score:2, Insightful)

    by ceroklis ( 1083863 )
    Don't put your alarm clock next to your bed, but at the other end of the room. But of course, useless gadgets are cool.
  • What happens if I put one of those next to my bedside table?
    • A colleague and I once discussed rigging a bucket of water over the bed, with a rope that would be somehow pulled to tip the water over the unsuspecting user at the appropriate time.

      It seemed promising, but the lawsuit potential killed it - what if the pilot light on the central heating had gone out overnight, and you actually tipped a block of ice onto the user's head? He'd definitely sleep in, then.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by ettlz ( 639203 )
        Actually, I was thinking more along the lines of waiting for Clocky to go off and then watching the motherfucker drown itself...
  • Yes, a couple of years old invention seems about right [slashdot.org]. At least, it was on slashdot back in 2005...

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by MORB ( 793798 )
      It is news because now you can buy one.
      But it would have required you to actually read the thing instead of immediately switching to the "you suck this is old news I've seen this 50 years ago" mode.

      • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

        by Draconnery ( 897781 )
        You forgot the rule that says, "It's never ok to post a story about any new product or technology on Slashdot."

        If the article is forecasting a future product, it is obviously "vaporware," but anything that actually exists has been in the works for at least long enough to build it, making it "oldnews."

        Whatevs.

  • Imagine... (Score:4, Funny)

    by Toreo asesino ( 951231 ) on Tuesday April 17, 2007 @03:51AM (#18764653) Journal
    ...seeing one of those go off in an air-port check-in.

    Somehow, it reminds me of this - http://junkfunnel.com/sld/ [junkfunnel.com] - possibly one of the most irresponsible products on the market!

    • One of the funniest gadgets I even saw... At least one time I'm sad I'm not at the US to leave one of them at an airport :)

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by riffzifnab ( 449869 )
      Bha, talk about over-engineered. All you have to do is make a blinking cartoon character giving you the finger and you'll be accused of being a terrorist.
  • Put a normal alarm where you can't reach it, such as by the door. Thus you have to get out of bed to reach it. Then spend the $50 you saved on a pointless gadget on something useful like beer.
    • When I was back in college I tried this. I found that it didn't work for me.

      I could get up, climb out of the bunk, walk across the room (avoiding the random piles of debris on the floor), turn off the alarm, and climb back into the bunk without really waking up.

      It doesn't help that my "natural" sleep cycle seems to be from 8am to 4pm...at least that's what ends up happening if I don't have anything trying to regulate my sleeping hours.

  • Dollar Store Jacks (Score:2, Interesting)

    by th3rmite ( 938737 )
    I once bought a pack of jacks, you know the old jacks and bouncy ball, from the dollar store. I would put my alarm clock on the other side of the room and throw them down on the floor around it. When I would get up to turn off my alarm, I'd either have to wake up enough to step around them or suffer the bloody feet consequences.
  • It is called a 2 year old.

    • It is called a 2 year old.

      This is the 3rd reference to children I've seen in this topic, so far. Either the /. crowd is getting old, or being a geek is losing its appeal...

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by CharlieG ( 34950 )
        We're getting old. Heck, /. is getting old (how long has it been around?)

        2YOs were a good Alarm clock - when they get to be 10, they have stopped being good alarm clocks, and have started the teen groggies - My daughter sleeps through an alarm that wakes me in the next room - that said, she will wake up the instant I tap on her door and say "time to get up" - because the knows the next step is me getting a gallon bag of ice cubes and tossing it under her covers...
  • The clock is typical of the kind of nonsense that came out of the Media Lab, but my girlfriend (yes, real) is very interested in the tote laptop bags. I can see why - the bags you usually get for laptops are about as dorky as it gets.
    • That guy's laptop bag is doomed to fail simply because it is called the lapsac. I already have one sac in my lap, and do not need another.
  • ... Has a review of this clock:

    http://www.the-gadgeteer.com/review/clocky [the-gadgeteer.com]

  • I already use the "put the alarm where you can't reach it" trick, and when I'm tired I just ignore the alarm
  • When I first saw this clock's prototype, which I believe was covered in carpet or something, I said wow, I really want to have this. Although I'm not sure of the value now, other than amusement, since I keep my non-moving alarm clock on the other side of my room. I have to get up and walk across the room to turn it off. I know that getting up and searching for this clock is one of the big selling points, but I noticed that a lot of people seem to keep their alarm clocks like right next to their heads where

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