As my wife and I were driving along on our trip this week, I also thought of something additional regarding the ambient-noise-volume thing...
One thing I often do while driving is to turn down the volume while I'm having a conversation, then I turn it up again when the conversation fizzles out. If there were a way for the mic to "know the difference" between conversation and ambient noise, then it could reduce the volume when we're talking and increase it again when we stop talking.
Curiouser and curiouser...
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Tony Fabris