Sarah
© MinyanvilleMute point.
Would you give anything to never have to hear about Sarah Palin again? Or rid your life of Kim Kardashian? Or throttle every Jersey Shore cast member into an inescapable limbo of obscurity?

Well, with a crash course in circuitry, you can keep from hearing about Sheen, Trump, or just about any Media Harlot with Enough Already -- a gadget designed by Matt Richardson for tinker mag Make.

"I don't know about you, but I'm a little sick of hearing about the same people on TV over and over again," Richardson writes. "I came up with this Arduino-based solution to mute my TV so that I don't have to hear about Donald Trump's feud with whomever or Charlie Sheen's most recent rant."

The gadget detects the incoming closed captioning transcription, scanning for any preselected words and phrases. When one should pop up, the infrared light triggers a television's mute function and doesn't un-mute the set until thirty seconds have passed from the last mention.

Ingenious.