April 2015:
Know Your Noise website gets the thumbs up from DJ Tech Tools
Popular US-based website DJ Tech Tools, the place to go for news, information and resources for DJs and dance music producers, has written an interesting and supportive review of the National Acoustic Laboratories’ Know Your Noise (KYN) website. Article author Dean Zulueta even posted his noise-risk profile based on the information he put into the website’s Noise Risk Calculator (see below).
As a result of the DJ Tech Tools article, there was a significant spike in traffic to the website, which has helped the KYN website and HEARsmart gain a wider, and particularly relevant, international audience.
Articles like this are important because they highlights the existence of individuals who love their music or promote it for a living, that really appreciate the dangers of excessive noise exposure. Besides the article itself, the comments below also speak volumes about the hearing loss risk that DJs regularly encounter. For example, follower ‘808’ provided a personal insight into hearing loss resulting from a successful DJ career that spanned three decades.
“I cannot emphasis enough the importance of DJ’s taking care of their hearing at not exposing themselves to prolonged loud music over years. As a 48 year-old DJ with over 30 years spent spinning in clubs I am now speaking as someone who suffers from some hearing loss which isn’t great. The effects can be wide-ranging including tinnitus and also gradual overall hearing loss, which is what I suffer from.
I have trouble picking up different sounds especially if there is an underlying noise. I have terrible trouble hearing conversations in bars because the ambient noise seem the same as those speaking to me which makes picking out sounds difficult, mostly impossible, it’s all the same dull volume to me – It’s no fun keep saying ‘pardon’ or ‘could you say that again’ all night and I tend to avoid those places now because of this. So it is a life-changing condition that will only ever get worse and I can only endorse any article that highlights this for any younger DJ’s who can take preventive measures before it’s too late.
My own message to those young DJ’s is take care of your hearing and please don’t abuse it, otherwise the effects will creep up on you in time and the damage is permanent….Fact!!”
HEARsmart need organisations like DJ Tech Tools and people like Dean to champion this cause and get the message out there about the dangers associated with noise exposure, so others can know the risk and take action to prevent hearing loss. Thanks for your support DJ Tech Tools!