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Comment by The5thElephant | Hacker News Reader

This is very cool and I know a LOT of people who would buy and wear these. If you productized these (possibly make them rechargeable and simply way to program the LEDs) they would definitely sell.

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Fortunately for the OP, that part's really easy; Simply wait for the tech news outlets to pick up this story, then sit back and wait for them to start showing up on Temu.

Like this? https://www.temu.com/2pcs-led-earrings-illuminated-with-whit...

You probably didn't watch the video. These are exactly the earrings used in the video to create the matrix LED ones. These earrings are just a fake jewel with an LED back light.

The article showcases a programable LED matrix, which opens up a lot more possibilities.

Those appear to be static. The ear rings in the OP are way cooler. But damn, for 4 dollars? I didn't expect even those to be that cheap.

In parts. But now automate the production part. Will cost you at least 50k to get done. Not an extreme amount, but still.

I just got a few for my daughter, on Ali Express they are less than $2!

I'm not sure about the rechargeable aspect, but for programmability you could use a small IR receiver placed in the center of the LED array. You really only need a one way data transmission and something like Bluetooth is overkill.

Could use an optical sensor like the Timex Datalink watches from the 90s[1]

Could set the earrings on a phone screen and transfer the patterns over. Sounds like a fun project.

1: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timex_Datalink

LEDs are actually sensitive to light themselves so with some wizardy you might not even need separate sensor

I love simple light-based data transmission stuff. I've seen it included in things like guitar pedals that have just a few config bits that someone might want to change infrequently. An app to change some settings can be as simple as just a little webpage! So simple!

Here's a (tiny) demo of this for my PCB business card project from years ago [1]. If IIRC this proof of concept was as simple as using a phototransitor on a GPIO connected to the UART peripheral with a very low baud rate.

[1]: https://www.matt.egan.me/entry/electronic-business-card-pt3#...

Now that you made that connection:

Concerts with audience-worn LED bracelets regularly shoot out LED floodlights to the IR sensors on each wrist. Being able to do something similar on people’s ears could be cool.

If you use visible light, then one can use a phone (screen) to blink the pattern to transmit data. An LED can also be used as the sensing element, just need access to both anode and cathode. Charge the LED and measure the discharge time - it is dependent on light in.

the weight might start getting bit of a problem here too? Hiding the battery somewhere behind ear could help, but ruins the conceptual elegance

Probably not worth the effort. Some women wear pretty large earrings[0] without too much trouble, after all.

[0]: https://www.regalrose.co.uk/products/glory-huge-star-hoop-ea...

Not without any trouble though https://www.self.com/story/heavy-earrings-stretch-out-your-e...

The patient in question wore heavy earrings for years. Wearing moderately-heavy LED earrings every once in a blue moon isn't comparable to that.

Usually they are large but surprisingly light, made from very thin metal foil.

Hairclip the battery with tiny wires behind the ear. You could put the controller there too if you wanted something fancier

I'm afraid they will eventually be mainstream, because we definitely need more e-wastes for vanity purpose…

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