I have a useful but kind of silly idea for a consumer device to automate the act of pressing mute on your remote when a TV ad starts playing. I wouldn’t be surprised if something like this has been done by a hobbyist, but there isn’t any commercially available device that does this. I came across a discontinued device called MuteMagic, which connects to your TV and tries to mute it when ads come on. However, I’m looking for a solution that will work without any connection whatsoever to the TV/computer/projector that you’re using.
Basic premise:
Software-enabled camera watches (and listens to) TV
When commercial break is detected, a mechanical arm, physically presses mute on the TV remote.
When the commercial break has ended, the mute button is toggled again, bringing back sound.
Potential proof of concept implementation:
Hardware: Raspberry pi + camera + micro servo motor + servo arm attachment + required mounting equipment
Software: image/video processing libraries + maybe audio processing (if required)
Key constraint:
this would need to work with all common remotes, so there needs to be the ability for the end user to configure the attachment/mounting to work with their remote. The remote also needs to be easily removed from the device so they can use it to change the channel.
I have no experience with Rasberry Pi or Arduino or servo motors, so if anyone wants to team up on this, I would love to talk.
If you’re a visual learner and don’t understand the idea yet, I’ve included an illustrative diagram:
check this out
https://www.mrmute.tv/