Airbags for your smartphones

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos has raised an idea.. that is either genius or completely silly – I’m really not sure which. He wants to put airbags on mobile phones, or use other safety technology such as springs or propulsion systems to help protect our gadgets.

This information comes from a patent application that was made public today, listing Bezos and Amazon as the inventors of “a system and method for protecting devices from impact damage.” A number of possible technologies are listed in the patent, including intricate detection mechanisms, airbags, springs, and expulsions of gas to reorient devices in the air!

This all sounds a little nutty that’s for sure, but things often do in the wild world of patent applications. The first idea involves using sensors such as a gyroscope, camera, infrared beam, or radar to detect motion, orientation, and distance from other objects. Supposedly, this will enable gadgets to ‘sense’ when they are in trouble, which is the first step in self-protection.

Once your favourite gadget is aware of its imminent collision with the floor, a number of possibilities open up. In the patent, some of the ideas raised include airbags, gas propulsion, and springs. In the case of airbags, they would be instantly inflated through embedded cartridges of compressed air or carbon dioxide. In the case of gas propulsion, the patent outlines a “propulsion element” to “cause a gentle or safe landing”.

While I can’t imagine an intricate sensor and airbag system on smartphones any time soon, stranger things have happened. Bezos and Amazon are obviously thinking about this issue, although whether they have any serious intentions to actually produce this technology is another question entirely.

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