Karaoke most irritating gadget in Britain: govt survey
Timeless, classic songs wrecked by tuneless, howling drunks: the karaoke machine is the most annoying gadget in Britain, a survey for the government found.
A TNS Omnibus poll for the Department for Communities found that the Japanese invention topped a list of gadgets that people wished had never been invented.
Nearly a quarter (22 percent) of those surveyed chose the karaoke machine. 17 percent said 24-hour sports channels, 12 percent chose video games consoles, while 11 percent said mobile phones and seven percent said alarm clocks.
"Seeing the karaoke machine at the top of that list made me smile," said Kane Kramer, a director of the British Inventors Society.
"When people are singing karaoke they are enjoying themselves, but as a member of the audience you are just watching somebody who can't perform -- and isn't particularly pleasant to listen to -- for as long as you can bear it.
"It is anti-social. You might have 10 people who want to sing some karaoke, which means 150 people have to suffer it.
"But the crazy thing is that people still do go just to be a spectator at other people's inability to sing.
"After a short while -- unless they're very drunk -- they're going to find that listening to performers failing to perform for two hours is not the best way to spend the evening."
Karaoke has turned into a multibillion-dollar industry since being invented in 1971 by Daisuke Inoue, a Japanese club keyboardist looking to provide music for a customer who wanted to sing on a company trip.
Asked which gadgets people would like to see invented in the future, 18 percent said a robot cleaner, 16 percent said a time machine and 12 percent said a teleporter.
Asked what the most important safety gadgets were, 69 percent said the smoke alarm, 64 percent said seat belts and 29 percent said baby seats.
Pollsters TNS Omnibus surveyed 2,584 adults in England online.

英国政府日前委托开展的一项调查发现，卡拉OK机是英国人最讨厌的发明。有了它，永恒的经典歌曲都被跑调、扯着嗓子大喊的醉鬼们给毁了。
这项由英国社区部委托TNS综合调查公司开展的民调表明，这项日本人的发明登上“最烦人发明榜”之首。
近四分之一的受访者（22%）选择卡拉OK机为“最烦人的发明”，17%的人选择24小时体育频道，12%的人选择游戏机，分别有11%和7%的人选择手机和闹钟。
英国发明家协会的负责人凯恩•克拉默说：“看到卡拉OK机出现在排行榜首位时我笑了。”
“人们唱卡拉OK时，自己会很陶醉，但观众们却不得不在一旁忍受着不悦耳的歌声。”
“这违背了社交规律。如果有10个人想唱卡拉OK，那就意味着有150个人要忍受煎熬。”
“但最不可思议的是，人们还是乐于见证别人糟糕的唱功。”
“除非喝得酩酊大醉，否则要不了一会儿，观众们就会发现连听两个小时这样的歌声并不是度过良宵的最好办法。”

自卡拉OK机1971年问世以来，已发展成为产值达数十亿美元的行业。卡拉OK由日本一名俱乐部键盘手井上大佑发明，当年他在为一位想在公司旅游时一展歌喉的顾客提供音乐伴奏时突发奇想，发明了卡拉OK机。
在被问及未来最希望看到的发明时，18%的受访者选择了清洁机器人，16%的人选择时光机，12%的人选择远程传送机。
在被问及“最重要的安全类发明”时，69%的受访者认为是烟雾报警器，64%的人选择安全带，29%的人选择婴儿座椅。
共有2584名英国成年人参与了该在线调查。

Vocabulary:
timeless: independent of time; eternal（不受时间影响的；永恒的）
keyboardist:键盘手