The press material for PartyUp looks like the inevitable underground rave scene from a 90s hacker movie. Beyond that, I’m not really sure what the real world case use is for an app that’s able to connect more than 50 Bluetooth speakers together, in order to output the same sound all at once. Honestly, we’re starting to get into Improv Everywhere prank territory here.
And apparently 50 is actually a low estimate – Ultimate Ears engineers have gotten the thing to sync up to 140 all at once. I suspect most will be fine with four or five speakers for, say, a barbecue or the like – after all, Bluetooth speakers really start to add up after the first two or three.
PartyUp is a feature update to the company’s iOS and Android apps that let owners of UE’s Boom, Boom 2 and Megaboom speakers (most of the Boom family, really) make a big noise, mixing and matching hardware to create a giant, synced up wall of sound (without all of the baggage that comes from working with Phil Spector).
It’s available today as a free upgrade, and apparently also goes a ways toward making the pairing process faster, even if you only have two speakers for a given social engagement. It also looks to be a good way to peer pressure friends into buying a matching Bluetooth speaker.