At least at a first glance, these perform about as well as conventional earbuds. You can listen for 8 hours before charging up through micro-USB (a full charge takes 2 hours), and there's an in-line remote to skip tracks while you're on the move. Wearhaus is touting "studio quality sound" through the 9.2mm, 16 ohm drivers, but that's something we'd want to verify.

The good news: the smaller design is also the more affordable design. The company is asking for a pledge between $69 to $89 to get the Beam ($120 when it hits retail), and you can score a discount if you buy the Beam in sets of two or more -- which, let's face it, makes the most sense. Your earbuds should ship in October if Wearhaus meets its goal. That's a while to wait, but you aren't really going to find social in-ears elsewhere -- it might be worth holding out if you like the idea of group listening.