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Comment by jsinai | Hacker News Reader

> particularly when I hear a mouse click getting louder and more violent.

What really gets to me is loud and furious typing. Otherwise most office noise doesn’t bother me. But that’s mostly because I’m surrounded by colleagues who I get along with.

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Then get a mechanical keyboard and type louder. That's how you assert dominance.

I hammer away at a cherry blue keyboard at work. No one has complained so far but I suspect it is because I have been here for longer than them.

It's actually a worry of mine that I'm very annoying to those around me in my open office and people are too polite or see me as too intimidating to say anything about it.

I can either be the asshole who doesn't care, and subsequently be freed from my anxiety, or live in anxiety but at least not be as much of an asshole.

I also carry a mechanical keyboard around, and one of the ways I deal with this is to type for a few minutes and then sent out a message on the office chat to ask if it's bothering anyone and emphasizing that I'll stop if it's even the slightest bit annoying.

Most of the time people tell me they didn't even realize I was typing with a non-standard keyboard.

If sound was an issue then the business shouldn't have made an open Office design.

Sound is one of those “incalculable” issues that, because it’s very intangible how it affects people it is subsequently difficult to put a dollar amount to fixing.

I had to retire my mechanical keyboard at home, because it was driving my wife crazy in our shared home office.

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