Man has 'speakers' implanted in ears so to listen to music all the time

A man has gone to drastic measures to do away with his headphones - by having small magnets implanted directly into his ears.

Rich Lee, from Nevada, US, is a ‘bodyhacker’ or ‘grinder’ – a person who experiments with surgical implants, the Daily Mail reported.


In his latest stunt, he embedded small magnets into his tragus – a small piece of cartilage just outside the ear – and built a coil to be worn around his neck.

He claims that this creates a magnetic field that causes the implant to vibrate and make a sound.

To listen to music, Lee has to plug his phone into a tiny amplifier which is connected to the coil around his neck to create a magnetic field.

This magnetic field causes the magnets in his ears to create sound which only he can hear.

Lee admits that the sound quality is not nearly as good as it would be using traditional headphones.

However, he said there are numerous advantages – he can listen to music anytime, anywhere, and the implants are also invisible to the naked eye.

Writing in the magazine Humanity+ Mr Lee said: “Having stuff like this done isn’t really the realm of doctors.

“Most Grinders rely on body modification artists to install their implants. I’ve had work done by the body modification master Steve Haworth in the past and have relied on him for advice on several project ideas.

“Steve instinctively knew the best way to go about the implantation in a way that would minimise chances for infection and would leave no scarring.

The implant procedure itself went very smoothly and the pain was surprisingly minimal.”

He went on to explain that he had numerous plans for the use of the device.

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He hopes to hook it up to the GPS on his phone so that it can give him directions as he is walking around.

He also intends to connect it to a directional microphone in a shirt button so that he can hear conversations across a room.

Mr Lee also reportedly plans to link the implants up to an ultrasonic rangefinder so that it hums when he gets closer to an object.

He believes that this would give him a sense of echolocation similar to that of a bat and he thinks that this invention could eventually be useful for people who are blind.

He wrote: “Echolocation is something I want to start practicing with now because I might be legally blind soon.

“I lost much of vision in my right eye overnight a few years back. I just woke up and couldn’t see well up close or far away.

“My other eye has compensated for the vision loss but the doc says the good eye can go at any time and when it does it will be
very rapid. I’ll lose my driver’s licence, won’t be able to read, and glasses won’t correct the problem.

“So I figure learning to navigate with echolocation is a good thing to develop now, not that I’ve resigned myself to blindness or anything.’

Finally, Mr Lee has said that he is considering connecting the device to a Geiger counter so that he can “experience the world of radiation”.