The Guitar phone

Another wonderful patent find by Barry Fox on New Scientist

"Musicians could soon have a new instrument to play – their phone. Motorola is patenting a cellphone that displays the layout of a guitar neck on its screen, and allows its keypad to be "plucked" or "strummed" by a user. The resulting guitar sounds can be played through the phone's speaker or can be inflicted on a friend at the other end of the line.

... The guitar phone can be played live, to adoring fans, or a melody can be composed in private and stored in memory for use as a ring tone or meeting reminder. Motorola says the phone could even be converted into a banjo or violin at the flick of a switch, with strings automatically retuning.

Illustration on Engadgetmobile.

emily | 6:38 PM | News, Buzz |
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