iSmell

December 8, 2003 3:43 PM

For a moment, I thought it was synaesthenia. For better or worse, it was not. But it sure did make my user experience far more vivid, and so I checked up on the technology ; yes, the prototype is out, iSmell from a company named Digiscent. Oh, I know it's been done before in a gimmicky way, but this is the 21st century. We have the technology to make it an everyday experience, one which would greatly enhance the Metafilter user experience. Users would have to, of course, purchase their own iSmells. Then, in making comments, members could - if they chose - pick from among a set list of smells available by means of a simple drop down menu.
posted by troutfishing to Feature Requests at 3:43 PM (23 comments total)

Dude, you are so high.
posted by anathema at 3:48 PM on December 8, 2003

I used to have a huge stack of Odor-Rama cards. All the smells were wretched of course, but I scratched and sniffed and scratched and sniffed and scratched and sniffed....
posted by anathema at 3:52 PM on December 8, 2003

It'd be cool if we could also have sex with our computers (while smelling them) without the danger of shortcircuiting our gadgetry.
posted by The God Complex at 3:59 PM on December 8, 2003

Hey, I never collected Odor-Rama cards......but this is the wave of the future, you know. Get in the groove! Everything is better in Odor-Rama - studies have shown that smells enhance learning, overall happiness, sex......

I'm probably just jealous though, of all of you sniffers, because I've got a lousy sense of smell.
posted by troutfishing at 4:02 PM on December 8, 2003

Perhaps if our computers were fashioned after some hermaphroditic lump of flesh-like material...

In all seriousness, I smell good.
posted by The God Complex at 4:05 PM on December 8, 2003

err.
posted by The God Complex at 4:06 PM on December 8, 2003

Love Lump is rough trade.
posted by anathema at 4:08 PM on December 8, 2003

bullshit.
posted by quonsar at 4:16 PM on December 8, 2003

I trust that "trout" would not be one of the proffered aromas?
posted by mr_crash_davis at 4:16 PM on December 8, 2003

mr_crash_davis - Of course not. That would be self promotion. I was thinking of a generic fish smell and then some boutique fish smells as well, like mudskipper

The God Complex - Eeeew. You've been saving that one up, haven't you.

Quonsar - Is that one especially distinctive? Doesn't it depend on what you feed them?
posted by troutfishing at 4:31 PM on December 8, 2003

It will certainly lend a whole new experience to the phrase "crapping all over this thread."
posted by carter at 4:49 PM on December 8, 2003

It'd be cool if we could also have sex with our computers (while smelling them) without the danger of shortcircuiting our gadgetry.

You can't do that with yours? Time to upgrade!

Oh, and I want fresh-baked bread and lamb curry on the pull-down menu. (Separately, that is.)
posted by languagehat at 6:11 PM on December 8, 2003

We have the technology.
posted by Wet Spot at 6:56 PM on December 8, 2003

Eeeew. You've been saving that one up, haven't you.

No, I was horribly exposed to it in a thread here in MetaTalk about a week ago and felt like distributing the pain, as I'm want to do.
posted by The God Complex at 7:12 PM on December 8, 2003

I guess I won't bother to question the purpose of a thread spawned by a dog's incontinence (which I did get a laugh out of, thank you - anything pairing ParisParamus and excrement). ..

... but um, that's a warmed-over article from a magazine that no longer exists. Digiscents was Dotcom Boom at its glue-sniffing highest, and, I'm afraid, the prototype is most definitely *not* out.

Or are you just taking advantage of the new "Ass MetaFilter" feature?
posted by scarabic at 8:14 PM on December 8, 2003

Ass MetaFilter? Where?
posted by anathema at 8:18 PM on December 8, 2003

synaesthenia.
posted by the fire you left me at 8:45 PM on December 8, 2003

scarabic - STOP IT ! STOP IT ! - the prototype is.....bullshitware ? Oh........

Well, moving right along, we'll have to do it all on scratch and sniff cards - 100 smells, 10 smells per card.... a little kludgy, yeah, but in a pinch - your sober realism will never stop the bold march of Odorama towards a brighter, more pungent tomorrow !
posted by troutfishing at 9:54 PM on December 8, 2003

i smell pretty.
posted by quonsar at 1:29 AM on December 9, 2003

For a moment, I thought it was synaesthenia. For better or worse, it was not.

Sounds like a scenario after eating a curry and discovering the tomatoes had gone off.
posted by Shane at 5:54 AM on December 9, 2003

quonsar - fine, but you look smelly.

Oh, and by the way - I know someone who swears that, for a period of time, she could smell through the telephone.
posted by troutfishing at 12:35 PM on December 9, 2003

I'd rather have a pony...
posted by SweetJesus at 3:25 PM on December 9, 2003

Don't forget TriSenx.

I was assigned to write a 300-word article about them for Computer Shopper magazine a couple of years ago. Here's an excerpt:

But smell is only the beginning. The product Trisenx is currently developing, slated for retail availability by early 2002, is a 7.5"x10" device that can be loaded with up to 200 “flavor cartridges.” It works “like an ink-jet printer,” says Kathey Porter, Marketing Director for Trisenx, and dispenses the requested flavor onto an edible potato-based wafer. “It dissolves in your mouth like a communion wafer, so there is nothing to alter the taste of the product,” Porter says.

Doesn't appear they've actually released this yet. Maybe they're still trying to work the transubstantiation kinks out.
posted by staggernation at 7:20 AM on December 11, 2003