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The Aroma of Fine Wine From Your Computer

Posted by michael on from the smells-like-teen-spirit dept.

SonomaSteve writes "Wine Spectator Magazine is reporting on a new computer accessory that could have you smelling fine Burgundy wine over the web. The prototype, called Olfacom, is being developed by France Telecom and showcased by the Bureau Interprofessionnel des Vins de Bourgogne (BIVB.) The technology uses 'essential oils' stored in several tanks inside the peripheral to generate aromas like hay, flowers and fruit. Will Olfacom be more successful than DigiScents? The French say, 'Mais, oui!'"

23 of 136 comments (clear)

  1. Obligatory by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Imagine the applications in porn!

    Actually, it would probably result in some shocking realizations for most geeks.

  2. Uh oh! by Phekko · · Score: 4, Funny

    Talk about adding a whole new level to the Goatse experience!

    --

    Sigs for Nerds. Sigs that Matter.
    1. Re:Uh oh! by HBI · · Score: 3, Funny

      Umm, which 'essential oil' is going to generate that scent?

      --
      HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
    2. Re:Uh oh! by Zerth · · Score: 3, Funny

      This one

  3. Again? by AstrumPreliator · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I've heard about these types of devices quite a few times before. Infact I think the first time I heard about something like this TechTV was still known as ZDTV.

    It's pretty obvious that it didn't work out before, I'm not sure why they're still trying.

  4. Time and again... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I have lost count of all these gadgets. Every other month, some geekish junior entrepreneur comes up with the idea to put a few oils in a box and connect them to a modified bubble-jet printer's head.

    First: How should this ever really work? There are millions of scents out there and our noses are really sensitive organs. How should five or ten different oils be able to reproduce all the variations? Remember, we are not talking of different frequencies of one single quality (as with light) but of really different substances. One cannot mix scents as on mixes colors.

    Second: Even given it would work: Does anyone want such a thingy? Just wait till the first script kid out there writes a worm that fills half of the world's office cubicles with the nice smell of, [insert your favorite salacity here].

    1. Re:Time and again... by ksp · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Are you really sure it's impossible to mix scents to produce a certain experience of smell? Like synthetic flavours/smells, very different compounds create a similar perception of smell. I believe vanilla is more or less impossible to create synthetic, but many compounds have a "vanilla-like" smell. Just like we trick our visual perception by mixing colours or quickly displaying a series of stills - creating an illusion like what you are watching on your screen right now.

      I would not be surprised if a limited set of smells (such as wine) can be synthezised.

      I have previously seen kits with essential oils etc. that are sold as "wine taster games", I think you are supposed to reckognize certain base smells and score points. Smell characteristics such as blackcurrant, wood, smokey, leather etc.

      Who would want it? Well, I would love to buy such a gadget and accompanying software to train myself into a wine connoisseaur - without having to open a single bottle of wine. I could "open" and test smell a $300 bottle of virtual vintage wine at work and drive home afterwards, no problem.
      Then I could buy a real bottle and drink it with some friends at a later occasion, knowing in advance I would probably find it suitable for my taste.

      --
      What is the sound of one hand clapping?
      cat /dev/null > /dev/audio
    2. Re:Time and again... by Sycraft-fu · · Score: 5, Informative

      Smell is based on shape. The shape of the molecule seems to be what determines how it smells. Thus it's hard to achieve a small just through mixing. Further, your idea kind of contradicts itself. You note that we can create synthetic smells and tastes, yet then think this can be applied to something like fine wine. Well one thing you'll notice with the synthetics is that they aren't the real thing. They may resemble it to some degree, but they are quite far off. Eat a strawberry candy, then a real strawberry and tell me that they are the same thing.

      For something like fine wine, where the smell is subitle and complex, it would totally fall flat. I mean that's what really makes fine alcohol fine. Wine smells and tastes like wine, be it jug wine or $300/bottle. However the finer vintages are more mellow, and have unique flavours and smells. Getting a synthetic to simulate something like the basic wine taste is probably no problem. Getting it to be like Opus One or Domaine de Chevalier is a whole different story.

    3. Re:Time and again... by tftp · · Score: 3, Informative
      I believe the difference here is that by mixing colors you can get all the colors in between. In fact, it can be mathematically proven (if you don't trust your eyes :-)

      However there is no obvious way to mix smell of vanilla with smell of creosote and get the smell of rose, for example. Furthermore, you can not get the smells of varying roses by changing the amount of creosote or vanilla. Smells are not very additive.

      This still doesn't mean that such a device is impossible. It only means that you need many different "essential oils" (a.k.a. stinky liquids) to generate some good number of smells.

      But on the other hand such a device does not have to generate many smells. A marketdroid may be happy if each "oil" generates just one smell, and that's it - the device just can make 10 or 20 smells at all. This would be acceptably good to accompany TV ads, for example.

      However I see no way in hell a device like this can recreate a smell of some good wine. It is even hardly possible to do in a chemical lab. Wine is quite a complex product. Year and age of the wood used to make the barrels may make a big difference; those 10 or so oils can't even approach that precision; I would be even surprised if they can recreate the smell of common beer - because they'd need to stock up on some yeast products among those oils, and these wouldn't last long in that cartridge.

      The previous device failed, and this one is likely to follow. The main reason to that is not its limited spectrum of smells, but the absence of any need for the device. Sense of smell is not very strong in humans, and we are not driven by it as we are driven by vision or by hearing. There are theaters of vision (movies), there are theaters of word (drama) and music (opera etc.) but no smell theaters. We are just mostly blind to smells.

  5. Vapor by BodyCount07 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    This has to be one of the longest running pieces of vaporware around. I've had to have ssen various articles about this type of technology for at least 5 years, with no products in sight.

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    The Technonaut
    1. Re:Vapor by Beardydog · · Score: 3, Funny

      It's delayed until they perfect the Duke Nukem Scent Cartridge.

    2. Re:Vapor by zcat_NZ · · Score: 5, Funny

      What's most amusing about it; even if it gets to market, it will STILL be 'vaporware' :)

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      455fe10422ca29c4933f95052b792ab2
  6. Wasted R&D by Bill_Royle · · Score: 2, Insightful

    If you end up being able to replicate the smell of a good wine by mixing a couple of chemicals together (like you would with toner), I'm sure that many wineries would like the recipe. After all, they could cut costs by just using some non-toxic additive to their wine as well, right?

    No - this would be a handy companion to an emailed "flaming bag of dogshit" pic, but for items with a high quality aroma, I wouldn't hold your breath.

  7. File formats by jjgm · · Score: 3, Funny

    I have odor reconstruction hardware, but people always send me .wif files!

    Unfortunately it accepts only compressed Nosepeg.

  8. Now EVERYONE on the internet knows... by neglige · · Score: 4, Funny

    ...if you're a dog.

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    My cats ate my karma. They also wrote this comment.
  9. Re:that's pure evil by twelveinchbrain · · Score: 2, Informative

    It's not nice to tease people with the aromas of fine wine and leave it at that. We want to be able to taste it too!
    If you'd RTFA, you'd realize that not only are they not attempting to actually duplicate the aromas of fine wines, but that a critic has already made the exact complaint that you did.

    --
    Not Found
    The requested URL /signature.html was not found on this server.
  10. Seriously, though... by blorg · · Score: 4, Informative

    ...Smell-O-Vision *was* a short-lived movie fad in 1960. During the 50s in particular the movie industry tried lots of gimmicks (e.g. 3D) to counter the rising popularity of TV. The only one that really took hold (unfortunately in the view of many directors) was widescreen. One would think that all the people pursuing computer smell attachments would have learned from that experience.

  11. Re:They've finally done it... by kfg · · Score: 2, Funny

    I'm still waiting to get my, ummmm, hands on, Feel-A-round!

    KFG

  12. Alert: A new kind of DoS attack - H2S by GEvo · · Score: 5, Funny
    [Munich] A teenager comes up with a new kind of distributed DoS attack - H2S after .

    H2S virus/ worm targets vulnerable WINDOWS machines on the internet and causing the infected machines to reboot and releasing a small does H2S (a large dose of it will desensitize your olfactory) whenever the machine is connected to the internet.

    Oh, it smells ...

  13. I thought.. by Fullmetal+Edward · · Score: 2, Funny

    I thought the French said "Go away or I shall mock you a second time".

    Damn Monty python, next people will tell me theres no giant foot crushing things.

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    --- [Insert intresting Sig here]
  14. sounds like one of those bad future predictions by t_allardyce · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Dont want to be a troll but:

    No it wont be more successful

    Smell add-ons are like flying cars - we can do it but no one wants it

    Its not ironic, meaningful or in anyway interesting that "To a computer, the fragrance of a rose or a pine cone becomes just another group of zeros and ones"

    Computer games dont need smell and hardcore gamers wont give a crap

    No one will agree on a standard

    People wont buy one just to take a wine tour especially when it cant even do the bloody wine smell!

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    This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
  15. Re:They've finally done it... by FireBreathingDog · · Score: 2, Interesting
    I want to make sure these odor output devices are interoperable. What is Microsoft ends up locking up the market with some sort of proprietary system? What if they deliberately rework Windows to make competing devices smell like shit?

    Thankfully, there's an RFC for a truly open protocol: the Olfactory Transport Protocol (OTP). Hopefully, people will use it.

    --
    Shame on Google.
  16. Another stink product for your computer by maxhavoc · · Score: 2, Informative

    just ran across it the other night..

    Trisenx.com

    They make some kind of scent dome that uses refillable cartridges.. connects to the computer via serial...

    looks like an expensive useless piece of crapola...