Transport for London is placing signs asking people not to play audio from mobile phones without headphones on buses and trains. Public transport is described as a communal space where people share both pleasant and trying experiences. The writer tolerates headphone audio leakage but objects to deliberate, loud handset playback such as sports highlights. Shared crowd experiences, like post-pandemic carriage revelry, feel collective; loud personal audio feels like an intrusive overshare. TfL’s intervention aims to restore considerate behaviour in crowded transport by discouraging public playback of personal audio content.
There is that scene in so many westerns films, of the kind forever playing on daytime TV, when all seems lost but suddenly the cavalry comes riding over the horizon. The cavalry came to save me this week and they were wearing the uniforms of Transport for London, which runs the buses and many of the railways in the capital.
Notwithstanding the seriousness of the virus, we knew where the sentiment came from. It was a shared experience. Who can say that same sentiment applies to the dead-eyed sorts riding the tube and buses while transmitting tinny sound from their mobile phones? True, they are sharing, but it's very much their bespoke experience; it's very much an overshare. Photograph: TfL I long ago made my peace with the sound escaping from people's headphones.
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