I think there are hearing aides that are designed to accept
transmissions from compliant devices. I lost the URL, but I remember
Motorola announcing that they are selling a cellular phone that works
with this standard. The basic idea (I'm guessing) is that when the
hearing aide receives the transmission it shuts down its normal
amplification of ambient sound and only plays the incoming transmission
for a cleaner sound. It's also possible that the standard doesn't have
anything to do with this and is just a bunch of recomendations for
frequencies to avoid using to avoid bad amplification artifacts, but I
didn't get that impression (from what I can remember of this). Anyways,
I assume the transmission range is extremely short since your putting a
phone right next to the reciever, but you could envision making a
stronger transmitter that you could wear on your belt. I would geuss
that the hearing aide could be turned down to zero amplification so you
wouldn't have normally ambient noise blasting in your ear.
Such a thing would only be advantageous to those who want audio only
output (input would require another mike somewhere which could also be
wireless) since anyone with a head display is gonna have to have wires
running up to there head anyways (until they perfect the artificial
retina). This is more way-in-the-future stuff, but it would be neat if
you could implant an audio i/o transmitter reciever in your ear or in
the proximity of the tympanic membrane. The technology is all hear
already- the microelectronics of the hearing aid I mentioned,
implantable ID chips used in pets, etc... Probably the only thing
lacking is a battery (longlife, small, and chargeable by induction).
You would also want to code transmissions such that the device would
only play transmissions from your device.
--
Bill Nordstrom
University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center
5323 Harry Hines Blvd.
Dallas, TX 75235-9039
W:214-648-9227
Fax: 214-648-8694
email 
Cooltalk: 129.112.20.190
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