Some vendors have a sense of humor

[papaof2]

Received 1 April 2023 from an e-card company:

New feature! Send your scent

We’ve got some exciting news to share with you! Our team of developers has been working around the clock to bring you the latest and greatest in e-card technology. Introducing our newest feature: "Send your scent".

With this new feature, you can now send your scent to loved ones from anywhere in the world. Simply spray your favorite perfume, the one perfume that your loved ones recognize you by, directly into the microphone on your device when you are sending them your e-card, and we’ll make sure to pass on your scent directly to the recipient. This way the recipient will not just get your message, but will also feel you close by in an instant!

Psst. Check out the date today. That’s right. It’s April 1! Happy April Fools’ Day! We hope our little joke made you smile :-)

[feralferret]

This goes along with the smell-a-phone and smell-a-vision April fools jokes I've seen in the past. Thanks for sharing.

[papaof2]

Well, there once was an attempt at smell-a-vision but it actually was smell-a-movie, with scents released into the theater to coordinate with some key feature of the scene. If I remember correctly, it was a big name in movies but it was not financially viable.

And someone did attempt climate-a-movie, with temperature and humidity controls to match the scenes.

I think the killer for both ideas is that the theater had to be small enough that the scents or temperature changes reached the people at the same time as the images and that would push the price per ticket way up, as would the extra HVAC capacity to be able to make noticeable changes quickly - so it got cold when they jumped out of the helicopter and into the snow and not a minute later when they entered the warm cabin.

I don't think enough people would pay for a device capable of synthesizing almost any scent and then the on-going cost of refilling the "scent tanks" - which you know would be more expensive than ink for a color inkjet printer. I'm still using an inkjet printer that's 10+ years old because it uses non-chipped cartridges which I can get very inexpensively on eBay. Unless the smell-a-vision had some aftermarket suppliers (eBay), I suspect it would fall into disuse the second or third time someone had to cough up $300 or $500 or $1000 for scent tank refills.

[feralferret]

Remember "Sensurround" in the theaters? That didn't last long.

[freebirde]

At one time the museum at Reelfoot Lake had the seats on a shaker platform for their film about the 1811-12 earthquakes.

[papaof2]

Apr 15, 2023 9:11:46 GMT -6 freebirde said:

At one time the museum at Reelfoot Lake had the seats on a shaker platform for their film about the 1811-12 earthquakes.

I'll bet that scared some people ;-)

[feralferret]

Was Elvis singing "All Shook Up" in the film?