What is this thing? (Trump's Desk Edition)
March 2, 2016 1:28 PM Subscribe
What is the apparatus on Donald Trump's desk in this picture?
Looks a lot like a ham radio.
posted by Mitheral at 1:39 PM on March 2, 2016 [1 favorite]
posted by Mitheral at 1:39 PM on March 2, 2016 [1 favorite]
Well, you're pointing to 3 things: what looks like a powered speaker, some sort of disk device (or antenna?), and what looks to be a police scanner.
posted by Chitownfats at 1:50 PM on March 2, 2016
posted by Chitownfats at 1:50 PM on March 2, 2016
Best answer: The box on the bottom looks like a Zephyr Xstream, an ISDN codec for conducting radio interviews at higher quality than an ordinary phone line allows.
posted by zachlipton at 1:57 PM on March 2, 2016 [4 favorites]
posted by zachlipton at 1:57 PM on March 2, 2016 [4 favorites]
Best answer: So, if you search for other pictures of Trump's office, you can see that the microphone isn't in every picture. This particular photo was taken by Jennifer Brown on April 28, 2005. I do see it in this April 1, 2005 photo of an Apprentice Season 3 contestant as well (taken during the press rounds after she was fired on a Dominos pizza task).
Now the reason I mention this is during the early seasons of the Apprentice, people noticed a lot of bad dubbing/voiceovers. See this Today Show article which is about Season 2. Although NBC initially denied the dubbing, Trump admitted to it years later. Reality Blurred wrote an article referencing the same thing, "a very poorly constructed voice-over" about Dominos Pizza, on Season 3 (specifically, regarding the April 7 episode-- the article intimates that the voice-over was recorded sometime in the week before the episode aired because Dominos was upset about its portrayal the previous week).
I would argue that the reason for the poor audio quality of the voiceovers was that Trump couldn't be bothered to record in a proper studio, and instead recorded them in his office.
posted by acidic at 2:25 PM on March 2, 2016 [5 favorites]
Now the reason I mention this is during the early seasons of the Apprentice, people noticed a lot of bad dubbing/voiceovers. See this Today Show article which is about Season 2. Although NBC initially denied the dubbing, Trump admitted to it years later. Reality Blurred wrote an article referencing the same thing, "a very poorly constructed voice-over" about Dominos Pizza, on Season 3 (specifically, regarding the April 7 episode-- the article intimates that the voice-over was recorded sometime in the week before the episode aired because Dominos was upset about its portrayal the previous week).
I would argue that the reason for the poor audio quality of the voiceovers was that Trump couldn't be bothered to record in a proper studio, and instead recorded them in his office.
posted by acidic at 2:25 PM on March 2, 2016 [5 favorites]
2nding zachlipton. The box the microphone is sitting on looks like a Zephyr Xstream. I'm a radio producer and use them regularly. Trump probably had it to do radio interviews in high-quality sound in his office, eliminating the need to travel to a studio.
posted by Dalton at 3:53 PM on March 2, 2016 [1 favorite]
posted by Dalton at 3:53 PM on March 2, 2016 [1 favorite]
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by Wretch729 at 1:32 PM on March 2, 2016