I have a confession to make: I've just bought my first smart phone. And I do now understand why, before I did so, some people were prone to gasping with astonishment when they found that I just had a boring old mobile, and wondered how I was able to leave home without one, let alone make a phone call (actually I bet there's a much smarter phrase than "make a phone call" these days).
In fact, I'd already been forced to embrace a key aspect of smart telephonics - I've been no stranger to apps since buying a new laptop, but the advantage of being able to press a virtual button-with-symbol rather than an icon-with-label escaped me till I understood that I'd only scraped the surface. There's a galaxy of the things available on my phone.
I soon discovered that one of these things is a sound level meter. Two minutes later, I'd found lots more - most of which are free - and the ones I tried gave sensible readings and had some useful features.
On the face of it, the sudden availability of sound level meters to everyone with a smart phone allows a revolution in acoustic data gathering - and a very timely revolution too, now that soundmapping has become a key concept in noise abatement (thanks in large part to the European Noise Directive).
In fact, given that the starting-point of the directive was the reduction in personal noise exposure, a sound level meter you carry with you - a personal noise dosemeter, in other words - is actually even more useful than a sound map.
However, though there have been some projects in which people have used their phones to chart noise levels, it's not an idea that has really taken off. I've no idea how many people use calorie-counting apps, or symptom-checking or healthy lifestyle ones, but I bet it's a lot more than use sound level meter ones, even those on the phones of people who work, live or play in noisy places. Nor -as far as I know - is there any system of collection of level data from owners.
Of course, there are plenty of technical reasons to prefer an actual sound level meter to an appy one. The MEMS microphones phones used are not designed for measurement, and the frequency range is limited. If you want to know your noise exposure, your measurements should be taken near your ears, not your pockets. And phone microphones are directional, too.
On the other hand... you don't need an accurate measurement to determine that noise exposure is too high. With potentially millions of readings, sophisticated statistical analysis and data pruning can be conducted. For detecting changes over time, or season, or place, the low quality of the instruments is more than offset by their similarities and constancies. And compared to the cost of an actual sound level meter - to say nothing of that of the accompanyinng acoustician or extensive training course required to use it properly, the price tage of £0.00 looks like good value to me.
Maybe all that's needed is a little dot-connecting: like a system in which people permit their phones to measure noise levels and transmit them to a central database, in exchange for an (automated) regular report about the noise levels they are exposed to, and what that means in terms of health impacts. The data thus collected could be used to generate live and detailed sound maps of ... well, practically everywhere on Earth where people gather. And, over time, the evolution of the soundscapes of those areas would be charted too. A bit of publicity and some centralised data processing is all that's required. And of course, an app.
In fact, I'd already been forced to embrace a key aspect of smart telephonics - I've been no stranger to apps since buying a new laptop, but the advantage of being able to press a virtual button-with-symbol rather than an icon-with-label escaped me till I understood that I'd only scraped the surface. There's a galaxy of the things available on my phone.
I soon discovered that one of these things is a sound level meter. Two minutes later, I'd found lots more - most of which are free - and the ones I tried gave sensible readings and had some useful features.
On the face of it, the sudden availability of sound level meters to everyone with a smart phone allows a revolution in acoustic data gathering - and a very timely revolution too, now that soundmapping has become a key concept in noise abatement (thanks in large part to the European Noise Directive).
In fact, given that the starting-point of the directive was the reduction in personal noise exposure, a sound level meter you carry with you - a personal noise dosemeter, in other words - is actually even more useful than a sound map.
However, though there have been some projects in which people have used their phones to chart noise levels, it's not an idea that has really taken off. I've no idea how many people use calorie-counting apps, or symptom-checking or healthy lifestyle ones, but I bet it's a lot more than use sound level meter ones, even those on the phones of people who work, live or play in noisy places. Nor -as far as I know - is there any system of collection of level data from owners.
Of course, there are plenty of technical reasons to prefer an actual sound level meter to an appy one. The MEMS microphones phones used are not designed for measurement, and the frequency range is limited. If you want to know your noise exposure, your measurements should be taken near your ears, not your pockets. And phone microphones are directional, too.
On the other hand... you don't need an accurate measurement to determine that noise exposure is too high. With potentially millions of readings, sophisticated statistical analysis and data pruning can be conducted. For detecting changes over time, or season, or place, the low quality of the instruments is more than offset by their similarities and constancies. And compared to the cost of an actual sound level meter - to say nothing of that of the accompanyinng acoustician or extensive training course required to use it properly, the price tage of £0.00 looks like good value to me.
Maybe all that's needed is a little dot-connecting: like a system in which people permit their phones to measure noise levels and transmit them to a central database, in exchange for an (automated) regular report about the noise levels they are exposed to, and what that means in terms of health impacts. The data thus collected could be used to generate live and detailed sound maps of ... well, practically everywhere on Earth where people gather. And, over time, the evolution of the soundscapes of those areas would be charted too. A bit of publicity and some centralised data processing is all that's required. And of course, an app.