I don’t know about you, but I get very frustrated when I’m talking with someone on my cell phone, and there is a big delay between the time I say something and the other person hears it.  The problem is that phones sometimes have to add a delay into a phone call in order to get around the problems of a bad wireless signal or a slow communications network.  Phones and cellular providers can dynamically adjust the amount of delay (depending on how good the network is), but there’s a problem.  What if you delay the call by 2 seconds, and then the network gets better?  You’re stuck at a 2-second delay!  Unless, of course, you drop some of the conversation in order to reduce the delay.

But what part of the conversation do you drop?  Maybe you wait for silences… or cut out little tiny chunks so that it’s not very noticeable.  I just came across this patent which has another solution altogether.  The idea is that you use a sensor to detect how far a person’s ear is from the handset!  If their ear is close, you keep playing the delayed signal.  But if they stop listening, you can safely cut some of the conversation out and reduce the delay.  Sweet idea!

I don’t know if any cell phone makers actually do this in their phones, but just in case, if you find yourself in a laggy phone call, just… stop listening for a second or two.