Thanks to our sponsor!

We would like to thank our sponsor: Earbuds and their offspring site Kids Earbuds. These folks have been nice enough to share office, server and other services with us. They promote products which are all under 85db on their KidsEarbuds.com website. Supporting them will help support this Safe Audio blog.

Welcome to 85db.org dedicated to safe audio!

Welcome to 85db.org!

85db stands for a decibel level of 85,  85 decibels or 85 on the decibel level.

 

dec • i • bel [des - uh - bel/buh]

noun.

1.)  A unit used to measure the intensity of a sound.

2.) 1/10th of a bel.

 

decibel  Wikipedia

What is a decibel?  UNSW – Australia

 

We are glad to have this opportunity to assist you with your search for un-biased information concerning hearing loss prevention, hearing degradation, hearing loss and hearing restoration.

 

Twenty-Eleven has been a year of much ado about hearing loss. At 85db.org we will sort through the products available and test them for accuracy as to their noise-cancelling capacity and frequency response.  It is our goal to locate the best earbuds, earphones and headphones and bring those items to your attention. There are some great accessories out there also.

More evidence…humans are to blame for hearing loss…not earbuds!

Once again in the news the headlines blame earbuds…

It seems to me the common denominator here is the teenager, not earbuds.

Maybe America should breed smarter offspring rather than blaming inanimate objects like earbuds.

As the teen population chooses “isolation” for their anti-social rebellion rather than sit-ins, they are listening to music to get “high”.

“We had previously demonstrated that positive emotions, such as laughter, were good for vascular health. So, a logical question was whether other emotions, such as those evoked by music, have a similar effect,” says principal investigator Michael Miller, M.D., director of preventive cardiology at the University of Maryland Medical Center and associate professor of medicine at the University of Maryland School of Medicine. “We knew that individual people would react differently to different types of music, so in this study, we enabled participants to select music based upon their likes and dislikes.”

Music is good for the heart!

Next we have:

“…they are playing it too loud!” “…genetics play a role”

AUDIOLOGISTS BLAMING INANIMATE OBJECTS FOR IGNORANCE IN HUMANS IS THE WORST.

Why do you think they turn it up?

It is a fix…like any addiction, the evolved addict will crave more.

So…maybe “bad” music is more to blame than “bad” earbuds?

Listen to “good” music and the endorphins will flow naturally. There will be no reason to increase the Sound Pressure Levels above safe audio at 85db.

Earbuds are not to blame for hearing loss?

Amazing after blaming earbuds, iPods, and then teenagers in general now we come to find out NOISE is the culprit!

“According to decade-old data from the National Institutes of Health, more than a third of the 28 million Americans with hearing difficulties lost their hearing at least partially due to noise.

And the problem is getting worse year by year. The ability to detect high frequency is the first to go, followed by volume in general.

The culprits are headphones, killer amps, and the proliferation of power tools and other loud home appliances that our grandparents didn’t have.”

Looks like another case of personal responsibility. We don’t have a hearing degradation epidemic, we have an epidemic of people who learned the hard way what the designers of the products knew in the beginning. That is…no matter what they tell listeners, the listeners will turn the volume up and listen as long as is palatable.

I would liken this to selling a teenage male a car with a V-8 engine in it and thinking he will drive the speed limit. It isn’t going to happen.

IF the audio industry cared about solving hearing degradation their solution would be Sound Pressure Level limited products which do not exceed safe audio at 85db.

Unlike ALL products, and just like every solution. Pretty simple.

Informative Links: Safe Audio at 85db

Consumer Electronics Associations “The Safety of Your Ears is in Your Hands“

Headwize: “Preventing Hearing Damage When Listening With Headphones“

Digital Recordings: “Common Misconceptions About Hearing“

Acoustic Sound Definitions

Online Hearing Tests

Here is a link to common misconceptions about hearing and safe audio listening levels.

Ads on 85db.org…

85db.org has a minimal budget and very few bills. However, to keep the oatmeal hot, bananas peeled and server running we will have product and probably adsense ads running. We will do our best to exclude any specific product ads or specific product endorsements.

 

So much for that ad!
 

I’ll explain:

We may run an ad for Sony which if you click on the ad we get a few pennies. We won’t run and ad for Sony MDR-EXYZ11 where we make a commission on the sale of a specific product from the manufacturer.

We will review and give our opinions about products and advise where you can purchase them.

We will also run product ads like a cart widget or something that might advertise an iPhone 4s screen protector. If you click through and purchase audio-related products we will get a few pennies from it.

Our experience is that we will make 3-5% off any purchase you make from clicking on an ad or link to a commercial site from this website. 85db.org is no retirement plan at that rate…  :)

 

Safe dB Levels

Safe dB Levels.