If you've ever wondered how impressive science can be, watch this video of a linguist time-stamping phone calls using the background hum on a line.
Amelia Gully is a research associate in the Department of Language and Linguistic Science at the University of York, and she uses a technique called Electrical Network Frequency analysis to match background hum recordings with data from the UK's power grid.
Scott says that this isn't a magic tool that always works. Sometimes there might be no background mains hum at all, and sometimespression can stop it working, you need minutes of uninterrupted audio to have enough confidence in the result, and sometimes there might be no background mains hum at all. I love this because it's an accident of technology that has created a tool that sounds like a science fiction novel.
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