Saturday, August 15, 2020

Office Noise Simulators

During the first few days of quarantine, many displaced office workers likely enjoyed the peace and quiet of working from home. Now enough time has passed for them to miss the typing, chatter, and other background noises they would have complained about less than two months ago. If you're feeling nostalgic for the bustle of your workplace, this website, designed by Reichenbergerstr 121, can keep you company.

This tool, spotted by Lifehacker, simulates the ordinary, sometimes distracting noises of office life. When you visit imisstheoffice.eu and press the play button in the bottom left corner, a track of soft typing and muffled conversations fills your speakers. To adjust the number of colleagues sharing your space, toggle the tool in the bottom right corner.

Clicking the objects animating the page will add more sounds to the mix. A scanner, a water cooler, and a ping pong table are just a few of the office noise-makers you can activate to make your home feel less empty (or maybe remind you that working in silence isn't that bad).

People used to working outside an office before quarantine may be missing other sounds right now, like those of public spaces. This tool recreates the ambient noises of cafés around the globe.

by Michele Debczak, Lifehacker | Read more:
Image: Oli Scarff
[ed. Pretty cool. Here are the sites: Sounds of Collegues; Hipster Sound; and I Miss the Office.]