Bose QuietComfort Earbuds Noise-Canceling Bluetooth Headphones (Black)

Black is a color that results from the absence or complete absorption of visible light. It is an achromatic color, without chroma, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or figuratively to represent darkness. Black and white have often been used to describe opposites such as good and evil, the Dark Ages versus the Age of Enlightenment, and night versus day. Since the Middle Ages, black has been the symbolic color of solemnity and authority, and for this reason it is still commonly worn by judges and magistrates.

Black was one of the first colors used by artists in Neolithic cave paintings. It was used in ancient Egypt and Greece as the color of the underworld. In the Roman Empire, it became the color of mourning, and over the centuries it was frequently associated with death, evil, witches, and magic. In the 14th century, it was worn by royalty, clergy, judges, and government officials in much of Europe. It became the color worn by English romantic poets, businessmen and statesmen in the 19th century, and a high fashion color in the 20th century. According to surveys in Europe and North America, it is the color most commonly associated with mourning, the end, secrets, magic, force, violence, fear, evil, and elegance.

Black is the most common ink color used for printing books, newspapers and documents, as it provides the highest contrast with white paper and thus is the easiest color to read. Similarly, black text on a white screen is the most common format used on computer screens. As of September 2019, the darkest material is made by MIT engineers from vertically aligned carbon nanotubes.

Bluetooth is a short-range wireless technology standard that is used for exchanging data between fixed and mobile devices over short distances and building personal area networks (PANs). In the most widely used mode, transmission power is limited to 2.5 milliwatts, giving it a very short range of up to 10 metres (33 ft). It employs UHF radio waves in the ISM bands, from 2.402 GHz to 2.48 GHz. It is mainly used as an alternative to wired connections to exchange files between nearby portable devices and connect cell phones and music players with wireless headphones, wireless speakers, HIFI systems, car audio and wireless transmission between TVs and soundbars.

Bluetooth is managed by the Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG), which has more than 35,000 member companies in the areas of telecommunication, computing, networking, and consumer electronics. The IEEE standardized Bluetooth as IEEE 802.15.1 but no longer maintains the standard. The Bluetooth SIG oversees the development of the specification, manages the qualification program, and protects the trademarks. A manufacturer must meet Bluetooth SIG standards to market it as a Bluetooth device. A network of patents applies to the technology, which is licensed to individual qualifying devices. As of 2021, 4.7 billion Bluetooth integrated circuit chips are shipped annually. Bluetooth was first demonstrated in space in 2024, an early test envisioned to enhance IoT capabilities.

Bose may refer to:

• Bose (crater), a lunar crater.
• Bose (film), a 2004 Indian Tamil film starring Srikanth and Sneha
• Bose (surname), a surname (and list of people with the name)
• Bose (given name), a given name
• Bose, Italy, a frazione in Magnano, Province of Biella
  • Bose Monastic Community, a monastic community in the village
• Bose, Poland
• Bose Corporation, an audio company
• Bose Ogulu, Nigerian manager of Burna Boy
• Baise, or Bose, a prefecture-level city in Guangxi, China
• Bose: The Forgotten Hero, a 2004 Indian film about Subhas Chandra Bose
• Bose: Dead/Alive, a web series about Subhas Chandra Bose

Earbuds may refer to:

• Cotton swab, a small wad of cotton wrapped around one or both ends of a short plastic rod
• Earphones

Headphones are a pair of small loudspeaker drivers worn on or around the head over a user's ears. They are electroacoustic transducers, which convert an electrical signal to a corresponding sound. Headphones let a single user listen to an audio source privately, in contrast to a loudspeaker, which emits sound into the open air for anyone nearby to hear. Headphones are also known as earphones or, colloquially, cans. Circumaural (around the ear) and supra-aural (over the ear) headphones use a band over the top of the head to hold the drivers in place. Another type, known as earbuds or earpieces, consists of individual units that plug into the user's ear canal; within that category have been developed cordless air buds using wireless technology. A third type are bone conduction headphones, which typically wrap around the back of the head and rest in front of the ear canal, leaving the ear canal open. In the context of telecommunication, a headset is a combination of a headphone and microphone.

Headphones connect to a signal source such as an audio amplifier, radio, CD player, portable media player, mobile phone, video game console, or electronic musical instrument, either directly using a cord, or using wireless technology such as Bluetooth, DECT or FM radio. The first headphones were developed in the late 19th century for use by switchboard operators, to keep their hands free. Initially, the audio quality was mediocre and a step forward was the invention of high fidelity headphones.

Headphones exhibit a range of different audio reproduction quality capabilities. Headsets designed for telephone use typically cannot reproduce sound with the high fidelity of expensive units designed for music listening by audiophiles. Headphones that use cables typically have either a 1⁄4 inch (6.4 mm) or 1⁄8 inch (3.2 mm) phone jack for plugging the headphones into the audio source. Some headphones are wireless, using Bluetooth connectivity to receive the audio signal by radio waves from source devices like cellphones and digital players. As a result of the Walkman effect, beginning in the 1980s, headphones started to be used in public places such as sidewalks, grocery stores, and public transit. Headphones are also used by people in various professional contexts, such as audio engineers mixing sound for live concerts or sound recordings and disc jockeys (DJs), who use headphones to cue up the next song without the audience hearing, aircraft pilots and call center employees. The latter two types of employees use headphones with an integrated microphone.

Noise is sound, chiefly unwanted, unintentional, or harmful sound considered unpleasant, loud, or disruptive to mental or hearing faculties. From a physics standpoint, there is no distinction between noise and desired sound, as both are vibrations through a medium, such as air or water. The difference arises when the brain receives and perceives a sound. Acoustic noise is any sound in the acoustic domain, either deliberate (e.g., music or speech) or unintended. In contrast, noise in electronics may not be audible to the human ear and may require instruments for detection.

In audio engineering, noise can refer to the unwanted residual electronic noise signal that gives rise to acoustic noise heard as a hiss. This signal noise is commonly measured using A-weighting or ITU-R 468 weighting. In experimental sciences, noise can refer to any random fluctuations of data that hinders perception of a signal.