These earbuds let you turn up or tune out the world around you

These look pretty cool. A NYC subway filter would be great.

These earbuds let you turn up or tune out the world around you

Meh.  Filtering out the environment, with a 5-band equalizer and attenuator, sounds like wearing fancy earmuffs to me. I can't see the point unless you operate a rotohammer for a living.

I'd rather listen to music, or enjoy the environment.

Besides, I hate earbuds.  They never fit my ears.

Looks like a really good idea to me. Imagine begin able to filter out your neighbor's yapping hound, or the weekend mechanic working on his damned boat engine (I had one of those neighbors).

As for rotohammers, they have made a device to eliminate that type of noise for those for a long time.