Technology That Stinks... Again
from the why-that-sounds-familiar... dept
What is it with companies coming out with products that have been tried and failed many times before, suddenly announcing that they're doing something innovative? Do they really do no research on the history of such products? Someone anonymously submitted a Business Week story about yet another company working on a product to add smells to the internet and video games. The Business Week reporter doesn't note the history of similar products, such as DigiScents that hit the market in the bubble years and went out of business rather quickly when it turned out people really didn't want to buy an extra device to smell things online (even if Wired Magazine did once predict it would be the next web revolution). Of course, the real innovator in this space was the early web design firm Agency.com who, in the mid-90s, created the spoof site for RealAroma, making fun of RealAudio. If they were smart, they would have patented the idea, and used it to sue all these other copycats. Of course, you could go back even further to attempts like aroma-rama and smell-o-vision to learn of other attempts/spoofs at adding smell to entertainment. What's scary, though, is just how much these "real" iSmell companies seem to just be copying the idea cooked up as a spoof.
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
