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Online Aromatherapy in Japan
prostoalex writes "USA Today has an article on Japanese telecom company delivering fragrances via the Internet. NTT Communications will send a combination of 36 scents through a crystal ball, which can be attached to a PC."
This can be useful if you're browsing the net with a laptop in the toilet.
With such a limited use (emitting scents), I wonder if the crystal ball would just come with the fortune-telling/aromatherapy software, which interacts with the ball locally, instead of going through the whole web thing.
In the future, maybe a USB ice-cream maker which makes ice-cream of your choice, after you ordered it via Movenpick's website. Or a massaging chair that starts working on you after you have made the payment via PayPal?
Rock that crushes, Paper & Scissors that don't matter.
Oh man.. I can't wait for this to go mainstream..
Goober1: LOLZ I JUST NUKED THAT DUDES SMELL-O-MATIC
Goober2: LOL WHUT SMELL YOU CHOOSE THIS TIME?
Goober1: DOE IN HEET URINE LOL!!!
Goober2: l0l n1ce one d00d
Excuse me, I don't mean to impose, but I am the ocean
Let alone hooking it up to the Internet...
The World Wide Web is dying. Soon, we shall have only the Internet.
A useful net product for most slashdotters!
Damn...there goes my karma...
Cmmon people its japan. if its useless and has an extension cord theyll devellop and sell it
perpetually dwelling in the -1 pits
The product and the domain no longer exists, but HowStuffWorks still has an article about DigiScents. There was also Olfacom and iSmell that claimed to do the same.
I can remember a previously story pretty much the same as this one, the device contained a few scented oils, but as somebody pointed out in the comments, smells, like taste, cannot be mixed together to produce a unique smell/taste in the same way that light (colours) can. IIRC, smells and taste are dependant upon the shape of the molecules, and mixing different shaped molecules together doesn't create a molecule which has a new shape. IANAP, but I'm pretty sure it wouldn't work. So it wouldnt be able to be hacked for any smell.. but give it time, with technology increasing exponentially it won't be long before we're in the nano-tech era, or smaller, and we can probably shape the molecules ourselves.
A scent deliverer is one thing, but a "scent scanner" would be interesting too.
A device that could record in digital form what an environment smelt like, then it could be reproduced at a later time by something like the crystal ball thing in this article.
The scent deliverer might have to get some more depth. Maybe it could be the next big evolution of output devices... For instance, visual displays (monitors) evolved from 1-bit (monochrome), to 8-bit (256 colors), then 16-bit (thousands of colors), up to the useful 24-bit (millions of colors).
An olfactory delivery device could evolve from something like this crystal ball which might be at 4-bit (thirty something smells) at the moment, up to 16-bit (thousands of smells) in the near future.
Build them into webcams, then geekettes would not only feel oblighed to wear makeup, they'd have to put on their perfume too! And geeks would have to shower more frequently...