It seems workforce distraction is not a new thing. Let's not return to The Isolator!

At Traffyk.ai one of the most common issues we see is that – in terms of the competition for your employees’ attention – communications teams don’t know what they’re up against.

The availability of distraction is epic. The attention economy is real.

But, although it’s gotten much, much worse, distraction isn’t a new thing.

Behold, the Isolator helmet, from 1925! Given we found this on a social media feed, it’s probably now done the rounds but, wow, what an experiment.

From Wikipedia: – The Isolator was a helmet created by Hugo Gernsback in 1925 to reduce distractions.

• The Isolator was first introduced in the July 1925 edition of the American Physical Society magazine, with which Gernsback was affiliated.
• The helmet was first created using wood and felt. – The mouth of the helmet had a baffle for breathing and had three pieces of glass so that users could see outside.
• It was deemed successful, but Gernsback had estimated that it was only "75%" efficient and said it did not keep out all sounds.
• Gernsback re-designed the device without wood and cut white lines into the glass so users could see out of the helmet. Gernsback said that the new design was 90-95% efficient and kept out almost all sounds.
• However, Gernsback also noted that the helmet could only be worn for about 15 minutes at a time as the user would become drowsy. Gernsback then added an oxygen tank to assist the user with breathing while wearing the helmet.
• Gernsback later patented "The Isolator". While he had deemed the item to be a "great investment", the item had disappeared by 1926 after only eleven helmets were created.

What do you think - 100 years later – is it time to bring the Isolator helmet back?