
Have we let the LED indicator light go too far? - imartin2k
https://tedium.co/2020/07/10/led-indicator-light-history/
======
hilbert42
Decades ago when I was training I was lucky enough to work under a very smart
engineer who taught me that the ergonomics of indicators and how people
interact with them was important (and thus ergonomics itself is also an
important part of engineering). The issue arose after I raised the question
about why the indicator lights on the racks of communications equipment that
we were developing in our prototype laboratory did not light up when the power
was applied.

He explained that in large plants such as a telephone exchange where there
were hundreds of racks of essentially identical equipment that the only
important indicator when all the equipment was working was a lit green bezel
at the base of the rack immediately above the plinth to indicate that the rack
had power. Thus a tech peering down a row of racks all of whose bezels were
alight was informed immediately that all those racks were working. If a bezel
was not lit then power to that rack had failed.

Indicators on individual items of equipment in the racks remained off unless a
fault developed within the unit upon which a red indicator would light up.
Maintenance and faultfinding was much quicker if the presence of a light
indicated a fault rather than no light at all. If the tech peered down a row
of racks and saw a red light he knew exactly where the fault was located.

This went hand in hand with what's known as the _fuse indicate_ which is a led
or globe in series with a resistor and wired across a fuse. Only when the fuse
failed would the fault light appear (because of its simplicity such indicators
are highly reliable).

Simply, using too many indicators is confusing. Unfortunately, these days, the
baubles, bangles and beads brigade of designers who use leds for just about
everything has never understood this. Similarly that green indicators should
be used to indicate power is present and red to indicate fault. Unfortunately,
no one bothers with these conventions anymore.

The Christmas tree panels in submarines and in just-in-time manufacturing
plants are similarly designed—strategically located/placed lights on the
panels only light up to indicate trouble (such as water breaching a watertight
compartment, etc.).

I've never understood why such an important subject as human ergonomics isn't
mandatory in university engineering degrees.

~~~
jcrawfordor
Airbus is known for their "dark cockpit" concept which is similar.
Essentially, the presence of indicator lights or icons on MFDs should indicate
to pilots that some action needs to be taken. Ideally, the action needed is
the same one done by pressing the button that has lit up. This should make it
easier for pilots to identify what needs attention, especially when something
abnormal happens.

A similar strategy they've taken, which the computing industry could learn
from, is a central fault management system which prioritizes any faults or
alarms that occur during flight and only minimally alerts pilots (e.g. single
warning light) if they do not require immediate attention. Instead of
distracting pilots with minor alarms, minor faults are displayed for review
after landing, when they are actionable by reporting the problems to
maintenance. If an emergency does occur in flight, having all fault
indications displayed in one place by severity hopefully makes it
faster/easier for pilots to understand the problem.

~~~
aeternum
If the fault can be resolved by pushing a button and the system knows which
button, why not remove the button entirely?

If a human decision is needed before pushing the button then there may be some
risk in making it too easy since the human will just push any lit up button.

~~~
jcrawfordor
I think one easy example to think about is a landing configuration alarm. This
usually sounds when the altitude is below a certain altitude (must be landing)
but the flaps are up (or something else is not according to the handbook
landing instructions). Could also be landing gear up but I think that was a
common enough problem that newer commercial aircraft tend to have a dedicated
"gear not down" alarm just for that case.

It's a situation where there's a pretty clear action to be taken (extend
flaps) but that change will meaningfully impact flight dynamics, will need
application of elevators and changes to trim, etc. and so changing it without
pilot input could be a real hazard.

I think a lot of more subtle situations fall into the same category of there
being a pretty clear corrective action, but the pilot needs to have positive
awareness of when that change occurs, and may decide to delay action or do
something else.

We can pretty easily draw analogy to this kind of thing in computing. Database
migrations are one I've run into - nice for them to be completely automated in
routine situations, but because they can result in downtime or old versions
not working in some cases it's a good idea to run migrations with an engineer
"in the loop" for uptime critical software. If it's automated they click the
button and do nothing, but having the button to click ensures that they're
aware of the change and present in case of problems.

~~~
nucleardog
I think you touch on what might be an easier example to demonstrate with here:

"GEAR NOT DOWN"

So the plane has determined you are close to the ground, but the landing gear
is not extended.

What is the proper course of action?

If you're trying to land on a runway or other normal surface (i.e., 99 cases
out of a hundred type of thing) the appropriate action would be to extend the
landing gear.

In that other case though, extending the landing gear in preparation for
something like an emergency water landing is certain to take something which
has a surprisingly good survival rate and turn it into a mass casualty event.

So we're left with the choice between "do the usual thing automatically, and
rely on the pilot to remember to override it in the rare event of an
emergency" or "alert the pilot and rely on them to evaluate whether it's the
right thing for their current situation and conditions".

I would definitely argue for the latter. Especially in this specific example
increasing cognitive load during exceptional situations to make the
unexceptional more convenient is probably not what we want to do. The plane is
not aware of the actual situation the plane is in. The pilot is.

------
ajsnigrutin
The problem with indicator lights is, that they're useless, until you actually
need that info. If i turn my head just a bit, i can see a 48 port ethernet
switch with 50+ blinking lights here in the office, and 99.9% of the time,
they're all useless. But, if something doesn't work, one quick glance, can
tell me if the switch is on (lights), if the data is sent through (random
blinking), if the ethernet connection to my pc is up (one specific light), is
it waiting for spanning tree to set up (light color), is there a loop (all
lights on, or blinking synchronously), and also if the connection is slow
during a calm time, I can see who's sending most traffic (frequency of
blinking).

I literally never look at them when all is ok, but when it's not, i get the
status info in literally a second.

Same with my home router with 8leds (especially the "internet" one), same with
my PCs (on/off, hdd activity) etc.

My prefered solution would be just to keep those things away from the bedroom.
Currently, in my bedroom, there is only one visible led (TV), and even that
one is very very dim red.

~~~
vidarh
Electrical tape for complete blackout, and little small black dot stickers for
LEDs you want to dim instead of completely cover.

For the black dot/circle stickers, just search for "black dot" on Amazon. The
6mm / 1/4 inch ones tends to fit neatly over most LEDs.

The electrical tape is easy enough to remove and reattach or replace for the
rare occasion I actually need to see an indicator light.

I thought I'd need to remove it more often when I "snapped" and put electrical
tape on _every_ device in my living room a while back, but I've yet to remove
a single bit of it. I'm sure I'll have to now and again, but it's worth the
hassle.

~~~
Loughla
I sleep with a fan at night - when my fan from college finally died after a
decade of use, I replaced it with a similar tower fan. It had a nice speed,
timer function that went long enough for me to use the auto-shutoff as an
alarm clock to avoid being jarred awake by an actual alarm. Oh, and it also
had

FIVE, HUGE, BRIGHT BLUE LEDS WHICH WERE ON CONSTANTLY WHEN IT WAS RUNNING.

What idiot thought this was a good idea? Oh, and snipping them from the
circuit also made sure the fan wouldn't work in high speed for some reason. So
I had to solder a piece of wire from one end of the removed leds to the other.

~~~
vidarh
My theory is that the prevalence of blue LEDs to this date is an after-effect
of people who grew up back when blue LEDs were rare and expensive, and who
came to see blue LEDs as a way of signalling higher value and who got used to
wanting to put blue LEDs in everything for that reason long after the
signalling effect was lost.

(it was first in the early 90's that bright blue LEDs became available, at
least at reasonable price points)

~~~
jfk13
I suspect there's a lot of truth in this.

This reminds me of going for an interview at Durham University in the early
80s. A professor in the physics department proudly showed me a prototype blue
LED that they had developed. It was indeed quite a novelty at that time.

Ah, yes - a quick search confirms there was research in this area going on at
the time:
[https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/0022-3727/16/6/02...](https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/0022-3727/16/6/021/pdf)

~~~
hilbert42
Undoubtedly I agree with both of you. Unfortunately, since the introduction of
blue LEDs little thought has been given to the way people react to them. From
my experience, they seem to raise the most criticism of all colored
indicators.

------
dorkwood
This is one of my main pet peeves with modern life. I've never seen it
discussed before, and no one I've brought it up with seems to share my
annoyance.

It's currently the middle of the day, and my microphone has a visibly bright
blue LED that I can't disable without dismantling it or unplugging it.

When I turn my monitor off at night, it has a flashing white LED, presumably
to assure me that it is in standby for when I wake back up and decide to turn
my computer on again. A note for any readers: to disable this LED, you need to
turn the monitor off by navigating through the menu and choosing 'monitor
off', and not by hitting the power button itself.

My router and modem light up the other side of my apartment with red and blue
flashing lights.

The solution seems to be to cover everything up with unsightly black tape.
That will solve everything except for the microphone, which has its LED buried
deep within its bowels somewhere.

~~~
hilbert42
A simple solution and less obvious than tape is to paint over the LED (dob it)
with nail varnish. Depending on the applied thickness, the LED can be blanked
out completely or simply just attenuated to your desired amount. (The tiny
brush that comes with the varnish is just ideal for the purpose.)

The nail varnish can be diluted with varnish remover or when necessary just
removed by it. HOWEVER BE CAREFUL - TEST AN INCONSPICUOUS PART OF THE SURFACE
OF YOUR APPLIANCE WITH BOTH THE VARNISH AND REMOVER AS BOTH CONTAIN ACETONE
WHICH CAN SOFTEN, MARK OR DISSOLVE PLASTIC.

Incidentally, I keep a range of nail varnishes of various colors in the
workshop, they're very useful for locking the position of coil slugs and
potentiometers, and the varnish can be snap-broken without damage to the
components (and nail varnish is usually easier to obtain than coil dope).

ANOTHER WARNING — BUY YOUR OWN (DON'T STEAL IT FROM YOUR BETTER HALF OR YOU'LL
BE IN DEEP YOU-KNOW-WHAT (I KNOW FROM EXPERIENCE)).

~~~
fortran77
Back in the day, I'd use nail polish/varnish to color over the windows of
EEPROMS that I didn't want to erase. And we used to use red polish on EEPROMS
with classified/secret data on it for military contracts.

And also, back in the day, we'd sit in the lab and paint our nails with the
red polish while we were waiting 30 minutes for the Data General Nova to
compile our code.

------
GekkePrutser
It's mainly Cheap D-Brand Chinese hardware like external harddrive enclosures
that really take the biscuit IMO. For some reason these use ultrabright non-
diffused blue LEDS that leave a big blue spot on the wall across the room even
in moderate darkness :P They're still stuck in the early 2000's "Wow cool blue
LED" era.

However, I usually end up fixing that with a bit of black electrical tape.
Overal indicators don't bother me.

One of them (which was not even a D-brand but more like B-brand: StarTech), I
covered once with a Post-It note because I couldn't find electrical type
quickly (and the benefit was you could still see the light somewhat). A month
or so later I took it off and found that the paper had gone all white from
being blasted by the UV light in the blue LED :P Definitely don't want all
that in my eyes. I really don't know why they do it.

~~~
gregoriol
Remember when LaCie had this huge blue light/button on their drives?
(thankfully you could turn it off)

~~~
GekkePrutser
Ooh yes those big extruded aluminium ones with the huge round button. I never
had one of those :)

I have to admit I kinda enjoy my 'skyline' of flickering lights in my network
'cabinet'. Switches, modems (fibre and 4G backup), a unify router, my home
automation raspberry. It really makes it feel like stuff is working away
there.

But these are all red, orange and green. I have a special hate for those harsh
blue LEDs. For some reason they really irritate me.

------
paultopia
The worst are wireless chargers on the bedside table. Too dim, and you can't
tell they're charging in the daytime. Too bright, and they're obnoxious at
night. And the lights are actually needed because the chargers are so finicky
to position, so you can't just slap a piece of electrical tape over them,
which is my usual solution to LEDs. I suppose manufacturers could have the
brightness level adapt with an ambient light sensor, but then the price goes
up. Ugh.

My personal least favorite LED ever, however, was a temporary apartment I
lived in that put a wifi router with a blinking blue LED directly over the
bed. WHY?!

~~~
delecti
I agree wireless chargers are super finicky, but don't most phone screens wake
up when they start charging? I always used that as the indicator for when I
had gotten it to the right spot.

~~~
jpindar
My phone's LED blinks occasionally when it's charging and the screen is off.
It's just the right brightness.

~~~
the_pwner224
Unfortunately many newer phones don't have notification LEDs :(

------
hannob
The first thing I usually do in a Hotel room is to unplug the TV.

What drives me really crazy is that lately there seems to be a trend to have
smoke detectors with regularly blinking LEDs above the bed in Hotel rooms. I
make sure I always have some stickers with me when I go to Hotels, but I find
it really hard to understand how anyone could think this is a good idea or
even acceptable...

~~~
kaybe
And the staff seem to re-plug them every day in many places, quite annoying.

~~~
ponker
First thing I do on a business trip is ask for extra towels and put the Do Not
Disturb sign on. I don't take it off until I check out.

The staff re-plugging the TV makes sense since their checklist likely requires
them to ensure that the equipment in the room is functioning correctly.

------
elric
I suffer from migraines. And like many migraineurs, I am very sensitive to
light even when I'm not having a migraine. Given that ~15% of humanity gets
migraines, and many of them are (to some degree) in the same boat as me, I
find this obsession with bright & blinking lights utterly _appalling_. It's
negatively effecting millions of people, with hardly benefit.

Useless bright lights are everywhere. Often without any way to tone them down
or turn them off. I don't mind getting funny looks for wearing sunglasses on
cloudy days, but I don't want to wear sunglasses indoors ... and yet people
keep slapping more and more LEDs on absolutely everything. I have little globs
of Blu Tack all over my house, covering LEDs on the most ridiculous
appliances.

Stop it. Just. Bloody. Stop. How hard can it be for a product designer to ask
the question "does this LED convey useful information?", and just scrap the
bloody thing if the answer is no?

~~~
freehunter
I have a stereo that has had a bit of modeling clay on its power button since
the day I bought it (in 2003) because in some really smart design choice, the
power button lights up red to let you know it's _off_. When the stereo is on,
the light turns off but the display screen lights up. So even turning the
power off to get rid of the lights in the room merely just turns a different
light on.

~~~
kaybe
There is one single place that design choice makes sense, and that is the
light switch in the kitchen, bathroom or hallway.

------
TonyTrapp
Bought a PC case last year which has a green power LED. It's infuriating how
bright it is in the dark, and despite being placed below my desk I can still
see it e.g. when playing a game in the dark. I wrote a message to the
manufacturer and suggested that this is pretty annoying. They were quite
dismissive and replied that it's "impossible to make it darker". I'm not an
electrical engineer but I'm positive even I could accomplish that task with
some additional resistors.

Edit: I should also add that the LED is part of the power button, so it's not
so simple to just tape over it. If I want to play in the dark, I put a piece
of paper / cardboard on top of the PC.

~~~
frosted-flakes
On my desktop PC, the plug to the power button + lights is actually split into
its component parts, and each component is labelled. So I can connect to each
pin on the motherboard header separately. This made it easy to yank the power
and HDD activity lights, while keeping the power and reset buttons enabled.

~~~
masklinn
My fractal design case actually uses a separate _cable_ for each of them. It's
great.

------
rtkwe
My trick for really annoying ones is Kapton tape. They amber color really cuts
down on the passed blue light but you can still see them. If one layer isn't
enough you can add a second layer.

------
Animats
Classic NEMA color coding is:

\- Green - status OK.

\- Yellow - status abnormal but does not require urgent attention.

\- Red - you should be doing something about this. No red light should be on
for long periods.

\- Blue or white - on, no particular meaning.

This is still seen in industrial plants, often in the form of stacked
cylindrical lights on a post on top of a machine. Anyone can look at the whole
shop floor and see what needs attention.

LED color coding is

\- Red - 1970s.

\- Green - 1980s.

\- Blue - 1990s.

\- Color changing - 2000s.

~~~
kylehotchkiss
Literal LCD display with touchscreen to display status - 2020s (see
[https://amplifi.com/](https://amplifi.com/))

------
crtasm
Multiple layers of electrical tape on most of my devices to bring the lights
down to a reasonable level. A brand name battery charger and an off-brand HDMI
splitter are the worst things I own for intensely bright blue LEDs.

And why do my friends' Bluetooth speakers have both a power on light and a
loud sequence of beeps when you turn them on or off? Not to mention the beep
when you press a physical volume button on them.

------
devit
Just buy aluminum foil tape (or use aluminum foil + regular tape) and cover
them all.

Aluminum foil blocks all light and is thin and cheap.

You can also cover windows in places without effective light blocking devices
like roller shutters.

------
01100011
LEDs are cheap. It would be awesome to replace them in many applications with
a cheap, reliable indicator which doesn't emit light but to my knowledge
something like this doesn't exist. Flip discs don't seem like they'd be
reliable or cheap enough for a consumer product. What you'd want is almost
something like a single pixel e-Ink dot. AFAIK, no one makes such a thing, and
even if they did, it probably would cost 4-5x an LED.

~~~
adrianmonk
Non-backlit LCD is a possibility. If you need several indicators, you can
combine them into one LCD.

The downside is they are hard to read, especially cheap ones and especially at
weird angles.

~~~
Marsymars
I'm sure I own some product with a non-backlit LCD where you can push a button
to have the backlight turn on, which times out after some time. Can't for the
life of me remember what product that's in though.

~~~
adrianmonk
Yeah, that's pretty common.

I have an Opus BT-C2000 battery charger that does exactly that. Pressing any
button causes the backlight to come on for about 30 seconds.

Also a Garmin Forerunner FR220 running watch which has a dedicated button for
this (with a light bulb icon). LCD is a good choice for it since it's used
outdoors a lot and LED (or AMOLED) wouldn't be readable in direct sun.

------
VLM
Something no one discusses is this is part of the death of brick and mortar
retail.

In the 70s you'd go to a warehouse-superstore for electronics lit by
incandescent bulbs or maybe old school buzzy flicker fluorescents and it was
DARK as electricity cost money.

By the turn of the century its all palaces of consumerism bright lit with
modern florescent bulbs.

Now a days the remaining electronics stores sometimes have bright as heck LED
illumination.

The stores are more brightly lit than most homes; a device bright enough to
stand out on a showroom floor as the bright one will be blinding in an average
home.

As brick and mortar retail dies out, somewhat more sane levels of illumination
will be acceptable in products. Even now, its already getting to the point
that nobody cares about the stylish box if amazon is going to deliver it
anyway.

------
throwanem
Cheaper than buying a pack of single-use round stickers is using a sewing
needle to make a tiny hole in a piece of electrical tape, and sticking that
over the LED such that just a little light can come through the hole. It's
enough to see the state of the indicator when you care, and also enough to
keep it from annoying when you don't.

~~~
kevin_thibedeau
I use this to reduce the volume on piezo buzzers. A needle hole punched in
cellophane tape over the port. With sewing needles, the tip has a taper so you
can tune the volume by gradually opening the hole.

------
moltar
I just use electric tape and tape them all ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

~~~
mrspeaker
SOoo much electrical tape around my house covering LEDs and displays. Products
are designed in isolation - where one crazy-bright blue LED might be tolerable
(in the bright testing environment). But get a house full of devices, and
that's a lot of LEDs.

The one that annoys me the most is my thinkpad. Apple made the slow, gentle
"heartbeat" indicator when your laptop was asleep. It was a unique, delightful
touch... for a while. Then everyone copied it (making it far less unique and
delightful) - except they made the blinking faster, and the light red?!

Then Apple realised it was annoying and useless, and got rid of it... but
everyone else kept them.

Thankfully there is electrical tape.

~~~
viraptor
I hate both solutions. Many ThinkPads are okish with just a faint red led. But
some also have a pulsing heartbeat blue light on the side when they're
sleeping. How is that useful?

On the other hand with Macs now you can't tell what it's doing sometimes.
Doesn't turn on, but the haptic feedback works on the touchpad? Is it just
waking up from the disk? Is it hanging? Is the battery below minimum? Who
knows...

The small red led on x1 carbon is my favourite.

------
primis
I have a small RGB to YPbPr adapter that I use for my old TV which had a
alarmingly bright high intensity blue LED on it for seemingly no reason (it's
just a few op amps and resistors in an enclosure). I opened it up and removed
the offending light source and have been happier since. Honestly the amount of
Power on/standby lights in my house is staggering

------
tobr
Agreed that there’s a market for home electronics that doesn’t try to sell on
looking coolest in a store, but are reliable and work well in real life. No
beeps, no unnecessary LEDs or LCDs, no fancy branded™ features. Just simple,
basic, sturdy design that looks right in a home.

You could probably sell commodity hardware with high margin if you sold it
with this promise and story.

~~~
reaperducer
_Agreed that there’s a market for home electronics that doesn’t try to sell on
looking coolest in a store, but are reliable and work well in real life. No
beeps, no unnecessary LEDs or LCDs, no fancy branded™ features. Just simple,
basic, sturdy design that looks right in a home._

Start reading magazines about gardening, retirement, group travel, birds, and
other topics that skew 40+. Plenty of ads for such things there.

~~~
tobr
I get an inkling that this is very different from what I was trying to
suggest, but maybe not. Is there some way to read more about these products
without subscribing to some magazines I don’t care about?

------
arprocter
The display on our old cable box was green, and I had no trouble reading the
time from across the room; whereas the replacement has a blue clock and I
really struggle to read the numbers (the look-to-the-side-of-the-thing-you-
want-to-see trick kind of works).

I always assumed bedside clocks were red due to it being least detrimental to
your night vision

~~~
jeffbee
Your eyes can't focus the blue light. That's one of the reasons blue LED
displays are so irritating. A low-intensity LED segment or dot panel is the
best for a clock, but because they require a driver module and calibration to
not look terrible, they cost a lot (relatively speaking).

A calibrated amber 5x7 matrix is, to me, an unsurpassed technology in digital
display.

------
lorenzfx
I put power strips with switches on most electronic stuff to make sure they
are switched completely off when I don't need them. Gets rid of the annoying
lights as well.

I especially like those with foot switches on a separate cord. The power strip
on all the power adapters can remain hidden, but you can still easily switch
everything on and off.

~~~
TeMPOraL
Oh god, I hate these foot-switched power cords. I still remember my second
job, when in the middle of some work I accidentally stepped on the foot
switch. Hearing the distinctive "click", I froze. At that moment, I felt like
a character in a war movie, who just stepped on a land mine. Instinctively, I
pulled a knife from my pocket, carefully slid it under my shoe, held the
button down with it, asked a co-worker to fetch me my bag, and duct-taped the
switch along with the knife.

The switch stayed that way ever since, until eventually we had to move to a
larger office.

------
edelhans
One of the reasons I bought a FRITZ!Box was that I can control all the LEDs.
Lets me change the brightness or completely turn them off. I wish more devices
had a feature like this.

~~~
lorenzhs
My wireless access point (a tp-link eap245) has a single LED, and that can be
turned off in the webinterface. I wish every device had such an option.

~~~
lucb1e
My tp-link actually has a button next to the LEDs that turns them all on or
off. If I want to know whether it's my router that's broken or if the DSL line
is down, I press the button and look at the indicator for DSL. The same-brand
powerline adapter has it in the webinterface, I find that less nice but it
works as well.

------
alexhawdon
My last ADSL router/modem from Vodafone (UK telecoms/broadband company -
unsure who the OEM was) was amazing in this respect. You could configure it to
have all the lights off by default, and it had an infrared proximity sensor
built into the top - wave your hand to activate the blinkenlights.

~~~
Nextgrid
LEDs on most networking equipment are software-controlled. I can disable them
on my OpenWrt devices and even the Devolo stock firmware also included a
feature to disable LEDs.

------
manaskarekar
There is something about LEDs on metal parts that is very “sci-fi cool” to me.

To pick one category, status indicators on older Dell Latitudes and Macbook
Pros.

These were small, pleasant, and very useful.

The “breathing“ pattern is also amazing. So simple, yet nice.

~~~
mmcconnell1618
Sir, these lights are blinking out of sequence. What should we do? Shatner -
"Get them to blink in sequence"

[https://youtu.be/kG-0V-85H_0?t=101](https://youtu.be/kG-0V-85H_0?t=101)

~~~
manaskarekar
Haha, that's classic.

Reminds me, Dell Workstations have multiple numbered LEDs on the front panel
that pretty much describe an error in binary.

------
mnm1
Masking tape it's going to be then. It's interesting how such design choices
really highlight the lack of design that happens with most products, consumer,
pro, or otherwise. My tv has a red led that is on when the tv is off. Clearly
not a single second of actual thought was given to this design. I don't need a
light to tell me the screen is off. Almost all appliances with a light are the
same way. Designed completely without thought to their practical use and
consequences. Now that we know about the negative effects of light, energy
saving led bulbs look extremely unattractive. I'm definitely not going to fill
my house with them just to save a few bucks and contribute a minuscule and
irrelevant reduction in greenhouse gasses. Apple used to be egregious with
their lighted Apple logo on the back of its laptops. Talk about unnecessary
bothersome light. Sony and their PlayStation controllers with interminable
bright blue light is another example. And then there's the thousands of other
manufacturers who just copy designs without a single thought to how they might
negatively affect the user. On the plus side. Sonos lets me turn off the light
on their speakers and it's a very dim white light to begin with but a blessing
indeed.

~~~
northwest65
Yes yes and yes. I have a box of cheap self adhesive dots for the purpose.
They're so cheap that the average blue light bleeds through them slightly, so
anything I actually do want to have an indicator I use one for, everything
else gets two.

I always assumed those Apple logos were just using the screen backlight rather
than utilising an additional LED just for the logo.

~~~
perilunar
Yeah they are. If you have sun shining directly on the back of the screen you
can see the apple logo on the screen as the sunlight passes through the
backlight.

------
paulie_a
Yes There is no reason to have an off light.

Don't get me started on the useless beeps and talking everything seems to do.
It's amazing how many things beep for no fing reason.

------
pickledcods
Had a keyboard once, with three brightest high intensity leds ever seen
directed at your face.

Got an icepick and stabbed it until it was no more. Highly satisfying.

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ciceryadam
Mildly related, in the chapter Blinkenlights, Michal Zalewski describes the
led indicator technology, and how it can be used for passive reconnaissance of
serial data:
[https://nostarch.com/download/silence_ch05.pdf](https://nostarch.com/download/silence_ch05.pdf)

------
anotherevan
The power LED on the sub-base next to my TV bright I couldn't even watch TV as
I was squinting. I put about five layers of masking tape over it to dim it
enough that I could still see when it was powered, but it didn't light the
whole damn room up.

The clock in my bedroom uses an orange display, which I figure is better than
one emitting blue light when you're trying to sleep.

And speaking of blue light when you're trying to sleep: a CPAP machine with
blue back lit control panel so bright that I drop a face washer over it to
block it out. That one feels particularly ironic.

------
touristtam
And then you have the cell/mobile phone devices that have done without this
simple trick for notifications. Do I need to wake the screen to know I have a
new message or a new emai? I wish I didn't.

------
chrysoprace
I bought a fairly pricey, but sturdy pedestal fan to endure the hot Australian
summer. I read a couple of reviews and they were fairly favourable, but in the
end I missed the key flaw: it has a giant bright white LED indicator to show
the fan speed. It does not have an option to hide the LED indicator and so
I've had to cover it up with paper to avoid my room lighting up at night.

I know the message has been echoed by a few people in this thread, but how
hard is it to allow these indicators to be disabled or simply not install them
on the device?

------
szatkus
Seems like at least one company solved this problem. I have Asus TUF monitor
(I don't remember exact model, but they should be similar) and LED indicator
is almost unnoticable at night, but enough to see if the monitor is on.

[0]
[https://www.pcomp3000.pl/images/produkty/Monitory_32/VG32VQ/...](https://www.pcomp3000.pl/images/produkty/Monitory_32/VG32VQ/1.jpg)
(I couldn't find higher resolution image, the indicator is on the bottom
right)

------
egypturnash
I have put black masking tape over so many LEDs in my life. Often more than
one layer. Once I can no longer see them lighting up the nearby environment
when the lights are off, I am done.

------
cbanek
I seriously hate LEDs on things. Please at least turn the LED off after a
while, or have some mode to do it. My logitech speakers in my bedroom have a
blue light on the volume knob, which is meant to sit on a desk or table. I had
to put two layers of electrical tape on that one to block it out it was so
bright. Without that it would light up an entire room. (Then again, I am
somewhat light sensitive)

------
EricE
Leave the freaking indicator lights alone. Advocate that manufacturers let you
turn them off if you like, but I loathe devices that don't have them.
Especially when they direct you for some damn app when I could just glance at
an indicator light the majority of time to figure out what I need to know.

------
BrandoElFollito
This is why I like my Ubiquity AP and my Sonoff wifi relays with Espurna
firmware - I can programatically switch them off, on etc.

------
halotrope
It would be nice if the root cause was solved. Until that happens I just put a
bit of black electrical tape on annoying indicators. Especially on my notebook
with OLED screen, which emits next to no light when in terminal/dark mode, the
power indicator (white LED) was incredibly bright and quite distracting.

------
yen223
I've got a set of $30 wireless earbuds, the Soundpeat Trueaudio, which are
surprisingly decent for its price, except for one fatal flaw. It has an
indicator light that blinks when it's on. Which is fine when it's bright, but
in a dark setting the blinking is so obnoxious it is pretty much unusable.

~~~
bloodorange
If you permit me an unsolicited suggestion, I've had success using a black
permanent marker to dim overly bright LEDs to an acceptable level. For really
bright ones, which are causing trouble when the area is otherwise dark, I've
also had success covering them with black insulation tape. It leaves them
bright enough to be clear but not so bright as to cause annoyance.

~~~
adrianN
Nail polish should work quite well.

------
LargoLasskhyfv
Kylie Minogue - Your Disco Needs You

[0}
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iqtzMue6Izw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iqtzMue6Izw)

------
jmisavage
I have 2 LaCie Little Big Disk firewire drives. They each have a 1/2 inch
diameter blue LED for hard drive activity. Needless to say I have to turn them
around to face the wall otherwise I would go blind and insane.

~~~
cptskippy
The power indicator on my rack mount server has a single blue LED that
projects a 2 foot blue circle of light onto the wall about 2 feet away from
it.

------
knolax
As someone who sleeps with the lights on I don't get what the fuss is about.

------
blackrock
My TV confuses me, where a solid red light, indicates the TV is off. But a
blinking red light, indicates the TV is on. I’ve had this TV for years, and I
still can’t remember how to understand the LED lights.

------
irrational
I don't have an issue with them, unless they are in my bedroom. I need
absolute dark to sleep, so anything with an LED indicator in my room gets some
black duct tape over it.

~~~
em-bee
i had this one device that had such an obnoxiously bright blue led that it
would almost light up the whole room, once the eyes got used to the dark.
completely unnecessary.

------
agumonkey
next: animated car turn signals

~~~
encom
I don't know why these infuriate me so much, but this is the absolute worst.
Maybe because it looks so obnoxious. It seems like it should not be legal.

~~~
masklinn
Before animated turn signals, NA's red turn signals should be illegal. And
even more so the utter insanity that is using the same light as turn and
braking signal.

A turn signal should be amber and absolutely not confusable with a brake light
you absolute monsters.

~~~
encom
Alec, is that you?

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O1lZ9n2bxWA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O1lZ9n2bxWA)

~~~
masklinn
I wish. But I re-watched that video recently, he's just so righteously
_correct_. That volt is such obvious _nonsense_ it's infuriating.

------
WhiteSage
Dark red nail polisher works like a charm to (semi)permanently turn bright
blue LEDs into dim red ones.

~~~
cptskippy
I've been using black sharpies, they work well enough for most situations.

------
sunnyP
I was pleased with Vanatoo speakers that allow for dimming or shutoff of the
LED lights.

------
kaetemi
Both my TV and my router have options in the menu to turn the indicator lights
off.

------
jbaber
Lithographer's tape switches the light to very dim, but visible red.

------
popotamonga
My asus router has a phyical button to turn the leds on/off.

------
fnord77
I paint over them with either nail polish or model paint.

------
fortran77
I frequently paint over LEDs with black nail polish

~~~
hilbert42
Exactly! (See my comment above.)

------
mark-r
I always find it funny when I see a claim that blue LEDs were invented in the
1990s. My 1985 VW Golf used one for the high beam indicator.

~~~
reaperducer
My 1984 VW Rabbit had a high beam indicator that looked like a blue LED, but
it was actually just a super-bright regular light bulb behind a blue piece of
plastic.

