Shark With Frickin’ LED Tells People Not To Bother You

Everybody is busy these days, but sometimes it’s hard to tell. What with teleconferences being conducted over tiny Bluetooth headphones and Skype meetings where we seem to be dozing in front of the monitor, we’ve lost some of the visual cues that used to advertise our availability. So why not help your colleagues to know when to give you space with this shark themed WiFi-enabled meeting light?

Why a shark and not a mutated intemperate sea bass? Only [falldeaf] can answer that. But the particulars of the build are well-documented and pretty straightforward. A Photon runs the show, looking for an Outlook VFB file to parse. An RGB LED is used to change the color of the translucent 3D printed shark based on whether you’re in a meeting, about to step into one, or free. The case is 3D printed as well, although [falldeaf] farmed the prints out to a commercial printing outfit because of the size and intricacy of the parts. He did fabricate a nice looking wood base for the light, though.

There are plenty of ways to tell people to buzz off, but this is a pretty slick solution. For those in open floor plan workspaces, something like this IoT traffic light for you and your cube-mates might be in order.

5 thoughts on “Shark With Frickin’ LED Tells People Not To Bother You

  1. Since it looks like a welcome light, I would cause it to backfire.
    A red light on a piece of equipment used to be indication that it was ON, now it’s lit when it’s OFF! Meaningless! Defective. Dysfunctional. AAHAD-HAD riddled thoughts. There needs to be two lights to indicate status now.
    It’s time for a quantum bit indicator. Is it in the shape of a cat?

      1. That does make sense though, many people are both ‘working’ and browsing the internet at the same time, so for any customer-related job they are in fact busy and free at the same time until they can be observed doing one or the other by the employer.

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