The Japanese give us another reason to make fun of them
 

The Japanese have created what they call "Melody Roads," which are essentially roads that play music when you drive over them. Behold-

YouTube Video

The sound comes from these ridges that are on the surface of the road. What a bunch of crazy shit that is, eh?

That's fucking awesome. It would probably get irritating after a while though.

Btw, lmfao at Japanese terminator wannabe on the left upper hand part of the screen with :11 seconds left.

That was music? It sounded the same as the ridges we have on the side of some of our highways that are used to wake people up if they fall asleep and start drifting to the side of the road. I didnt hear any actual music, just a bunch of differnt rumbles.

And if you start drifting, it will actually play eurobeat.

Maybe the Japanese want to experience that RPG Travel Music in real life? :tpg:

Actually one cool application would be that, using either a WiFi or WiMax transmitter, you could have ONE song selected from say your iPod or whatever (Since more and more cars nowadays are iPod ready ) and have it play as you pass over, and then when the next car comes along, it plays THEIR song. Not really good for heavy traffic, but it would be very cool otherwise.

I could barely discern that there was an actual melody played.

Are you kidding? The Japanese come up with the best ideas, dude!

Musical streets? Hell yes!
Musical toilet seats? Also hell yeah!
Robots that dance? Oh god yeah!

This must be the happiest place on Earth. I'm convinced that if I ever visit Japan someday, I'll be shitting kittens the entire time I'm there!

*looks at the name. Looks at the post. Walks off muttering about fucking weeaboo shit making him ashamed to work over there.*

I'll be impressed when those little fuckers find a way to make the road play the star road theme.

I'll be impressed when they figure out the logistics behind launching turtle shells from the front of your car.

I lol'd.

Seriously though... I didn't hear any real music. I did hear tones, but it didnt... make a song from what I could tell.

And would the speed of the song depend on the speed of the car? What if you just drove like, 100 mph (or 60 kph, seeing as we're in Japan)?

Your math's a little off there, honey.

What a useless invention...

You mean this?
Get the Flash Player to play this audio file:

I think if I heard that while driving I'd end up driving off the road and into a ditch -- for old time's sake.

This just proves that Japan has too much time on their hands.

/palmface.

Glad I changed my name.

I couldn't really hear a clear cut melody either, just some faint sounds. Still, I honestly wonder what kind of useless but sort of fun thing they're going to come up with next! I'm sure that not everyone would enjoy this as part of a daily commute.

It actually is the song, "Miagete goran, Yoruno hoshi wo" (roughly translates to "Look up at the stars at night"). May not sound like a melody at all but for those who knows the song could probably recognize it. Trick is probably running that road at the speed you'd actually hear the song as it was intended for. 40km/hr? That's like...what, 25mph?

*facepalm* I could swear that 100 mph = 60 kph... guess this shows that I've never driven in another country... :eagletear:

Either way... does the song only sound right if they're going the speed limit?

Sounds like a really bad, gargled FF6 Melody of when Celes is doing the opera song.

Sounds like a performance of John Cage titled, 'rubber tires on asphalt - movement 1'.

Great, now before you crash and die (like those drifting shit on the side of the highways we got here in the states) you can rock out to a humming tune.

Wow. What a waste. Rumble strips are already fucking annoying. Like I want our rumble strips to "sing" in different pitches. Why don't these folks focus on actual, productive goals?

Needs more bus theme from Earthbound.

Post of the motherfucking year.