GEEK WEEKLY: THE KLINGGON

No longer is a ‘Klingon’ simply a snaggle-toothed villain from Star Trek. Nope, there’s a new definition and it’s far less threatening. The newKlinggon is the brainchild of Gustavo Leon and Francisco Garcia , who became increasingly frustrated with their headphone cords getting tangled into a hot mess while they were exercising. Without speaking for everyone, I think we can sympathize with their frustration. We’ll we’re happy to tell you that listening to your sweet tunes while running, cycling, skateboarding, or using your Shake Weight (Hey, we’re not here to judge) is all about to change. The dynamic duo explains, “The concept is to fasten the cable close to your body thus allowing us to fully enjoy your activities without constantly maneuvering around the earphone cable.” Knstrct touched base with Gustavo and Francisco to gather additional insight on this new solution to the pesky headphone cables. 3D Printing was used to create the soft silicon and rubber device that is infused with neodymium magnets. “The magnets are commonly used in computer hard drives and have tremendous pull force,” Leon explained. The duo has been researching prototypes and materials since November of 2010 and is now heading into production to get these bad boys off the drawing board and into your hands. Head over to Kickstarter to view out their video and check out our interview with Gustavo and Francisco below!

1. How did you and Francisco partner up for this project? 

We both share a background of graphic design, marketing and advertising combined with an avid and constant desire to solve problems beyond the digital and print world. Despite we have known each other for years we had never worked together in the past and I guess the gravitating factor was a mindset of constantly looking to improve and invent upon and around existing gadgets We embarked in this project with a clear and simple vision, lets work towards delivering an unprecedented exquisite and refined device to solve a simple problem, and in this way the klinggon was born.

2. How did you come up with the idea for the Klinggon?

After being tired of fighting around the earphone cables at the gym, running and biking we kind of had an epiphany and after a few casuals chats on product development and design, boom all of a sudden we both coincidentally stumbled upon the same idea and almost instinctively we knew this was the right idea to fully invest ourselves into the project.

3. Out of all the prototypes you created, what was it about the final one that made it the final one?

Ooooooh that’s a tough one to answer, ok we go back to a few abstract concepts in design we had been trying to understand and it goes like when you see a product instantly the perception is one based on form and function, the surface and how it feels but not the thought process leading to the end result itself. After many prototypes we were simply not satisfied, in retrospect yes the form and function was ok but something was missing and we were running low in creativity so we kept on going back to the basic elements of the idea, I guess here is where trying to think out of the box helps so we said lets take a break and evaluate it with a fresh set of eyes. As a matter of fact we said lets switch tasks and evaluate each others contribution with a critical eye and yes you can guess what happened next, all of a sudden you take a pencil draw and there it is that “Ahha moment” when all of it falls into place and kind of gives you that “love at first sight” feeling. In hindsight it has been to an extent an exhausting intellectual exercise but also very rewarding from a learning standpoint.