This article titled “Disco Dog LED vest wants to make pet pooches sparkle at night” was written by Stuart Dredge, for theguardian.com on Tuesday 17th March 2015 07.45 UTC

You wouldn’t take your dog to a disco if you’ve got any concern for their welfare, but how about bringing the disco to your dog?

That’s the goal of the Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign for Disco Dog, a “smartphone-controlled LED dog vest” created by design agency Party, which is seeking k of funding to develop the product.

Yes, on one level this is a novelty product designed for internet virality. “It displays a variety of animated patterns and custom scrolling text in thousands of colours,” explains the Kickstarter pitch.

“You can choose an animation or type in a message using our Disco Dog application on your smartphone. It’s a fun way to celebrate your dog, and also keeps her visible and safe when it’s dark out.”

That hints at the more serious side of Disco Dog: if its connection to the owner’s smartphone drops because their pet has strayed too far, the display will switch to a “LOST DOG” message to alert passers by.

Party is planning to make an initial run of 80 vests, most of which will be sold to backers on Kickstarter – although they’ll have to pay 0 for a small-dog version, 0 for medium-sized dogs, and 0 for large dogs.

(Note: you can get a decent non-LED non-smartphone-controlled high-visibility dog vest for less than a tenner, and handle the lost dog side of things via the low-tech medium of “shouting”.)

Even so, with nearly .6k of pledges with 26 days to go in its campaign, and a shout-out from Kickstarter in its weekly community email as a product to check out, Disco Dog looks likely to hit its relatively modest funding target.

With a projected shipping date of November 2015, expect to see four-legged models sporting the vests on the streets – if not the discos – of Williamsburg and Shoreditch by Christmas.

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