Portable Smells

Posted by: ♪Åκšhαt♪ on: 8 February, 2009

In: Gadgets| Tech
Comment!

Have we ever wondered how strange we would look to the people of the last century? We roam around with silly things in our ears connected with wires. Now imagine, if in the future there were smell sensors which digitally stored smell signatures. These files could be played on any smeller (speaker type thing).

Then all the things that happened with music will happen to smells. Smell piracy, smell bands, smellios (like radioes), etc. Apple would tap into the market and launch oPods(o stands for olfactory):- oPod Snuffle, oPod Classic and oPod Touch would be all the rage, complete with noseplugs and earphones (no earphones in Snuffle, though, only smells and no music!)

So what would it be like then? We would walk around with noseplugs pushed into our nostrils. And smell CDs would be sold and the popular smellback (playback->smellback, get it?) format would be .op3. There would be olfactory advertisements and commercials (hard to imagine how they would be, ain’t it?) too. And of course, oTube.

oPod Ideas (click to enlarge)

3 Responses to "Portable Smells"

1 | Itai
9 February, 2009 at 3:14 PM

actually I wondered…
I’m a first year student for graphic design (visual communications) and we got an assignment to create an object that assembled on the body and improves it in any way.

I chose the nose and made a “portable smell player”. it “sits” around the head (above the ears, like headphones around the head) and connects to the nostrils. the smell comes from small tubes that contains fabric softener/perfume etc. it have a tiny vessel to the nostril. you can change the tubes for your selection… the teacher really loved the idea.

after that I wondered if anyone else thought about this idea and found this post.

btw:
1. I also explaind the class that maybe it’s very odd-looking today, but it is just like the earplugs 30 years ago…

2. the name you came up with is much better then my “iSmell” :)

Reply

2 | Ak|Bo
9 February, 2009 at 5:36 PM

thx a lot for the comment
but there is one big difference between your article and mine because my idea is smells which can be somehow *stored* digitally and can be replayed whenever we want and your player doesnot require any digital intervention (correct me if im wrong). so, my idea is still a long way off.

by the way, even i thought of “iSmell” first :D

Reply

3 | Itai
10 February, 2009 at 9:59 PM

well, I know your idea is much more complex, and I thought about something digital, but the only problem was that I needed to produce a device that actually works, and programming of digital smells is way out of my field of expertise…

Reply

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