Remember that prank Google played a while back?
About scratching and sniffing your iphone or something?
Well, it’s not so far-fetched a concept anymore. Some nutty professors over at the Olfactive Project have come up with a device called the oPhone. And, as demonstrated by this dude (who looks like Vincent D’Onofrio and Mark Ruffalo’s lovechild), you can send something as recognizable as espresso via text.
(Wait…Who types like that? He looks like a dog trying to walk in booties using that thing.)
Since I don’t have an ophone, I’ll have to take their word that it works, I guess. I remain a tad unconvinced, as no one seems particularly excited (although the whole thing seems a bit awkward and staged anyway, so it’s hard to tell). And despite the name, the oPhone’s not a phone at all. What it does is link up to your existing device. Although that might seem a tad misleading, this actually makes sense from a business standpoint – ‘cause, ya know, why reinvent the wheel if it’s not marketable? People (who aren’t me) might upgrade to eleventy-hundred-S version of iphone, but they’re not gonna trash the whole thing and learn a new contraption just so they can delight their nose organ occasionally.
An accessory device, though? Sure. Why not.
As smell is the strongest sense that links to memory, I remember half-thinking about this idea a couple years ago. But it was more from an advertising standpoint than an interactive entertainment one. My thought was – how cool would it be if my laptop or smartphone could emit a scent that tells me what the new perfume or candle I want to buy is like? A sort’ve “smell swatch”? Then, I thought about the pop-up ads hacking our olfactory bulbs with the smell of beach getaways. Then I wondered whether a synthetic smell-replication of the outdoors could trick my mind into thinking it was getting fresh air. Then I thought about the porn sites.
(Better watch your tongue, Clarice. Or Dr. L will eat it.)
Well from vaj vapor to cut grass, any of those aromas just might be possible.
Along with accompanying photos, there are about 32 different scents available that can be mixed, matched, and cooked up to form up to 300,000 different cocktail combinations of nasal entertainment. And it can be hooked up not just to your iphone, but to your laptop and music library as well.
That leaves me with only two thoughts:
1. This technology means my dreams of starting a scent-music synesthesia academy are drawing nigh. (Even though I can’t even teach regular music. Or play it properly.)
2. Maybe next they can create a device that picks up on the sender’s scent too. I mean – the pheromones they give off – particularly when they lie (that’s a thing, right?)
That way, when it reaches my oPhone, I’ll be notified via the scent of bullshit.