This is my entry into the latest Viridian
design contest. Normally, I can't think of anything cool enough to
warrant an entry, but this one inspired me. I'll describe the dog
first, and the rationale afterwards.
The Aromaker
Ad for boys
Hey boys! Remember that really really gross smell you wanted to save
so you could share it with your friends? Well, now you can! The
Aromaker has a sense of smell unparalleled in the natural world, and
will analyze the smell, record it, and generate it on demand whenever
you ask. Want to stink up your sister's room? Get some dirty socks,
give them to the Aromaker, and have it sneak in and release the odor!
Think of the possibilities! Recording a smell is as easy as telling
your Aromaker to "Record Skunk!" (or Dirty Socks or Mud) and the
playback command is "Play Skunk!"
Ad for girls
Hey girls! Don't you hate it when you have to deal with those smelly
boys? Well, now you won't have to! The Aromaker can make any room
smell pleasant. Give it a scent that you like, and it can record it
and later replicate that scent whenever you want, flooding the room
with sweet perfume, wiping out the smell of your brother. Never deal
with a smelly room ever again with your Aromaker!
Ad for parents
While your kids may enjoy the Aromaker for its possibilities of fun,
you can rest easy while they're playing with it. The Aromaker is
programmed to detect several dangerous gases, such as sarin gas or
chlorine gas, and automatically goes into protection mode, generating
enough oxygen for your child to breathe, no matter what the
suggestion, as well as leading the child to safety. So while your
kids are playing pranks on each other with their new toy, they're
protected from some extreme dangers. In an uncertain world filled
with terrorists who have demonstrated their willingness to use any
tool, won't you feel safer if your child is protected by an Aromaker?
Design thoughts
When starting this contest, I asked myself what was one of the main
functions we associate with dogs. And the answer, obviously, was
smell. Tying that into the idea that this was a toy, meant for
younger kids, took me straight to the idea of recording smells and
playing them back later. There were all sorts of possible uses I
could think of if I were a kid, as was hopefully illustrated by the
different scenarios available for girls and boys. Later on, I thought
of the added safety feature possibility of the toxic gasses as an
added bonus to appeal to parents.
I do not know enough about biochemistry to figure out the technical
feasibility of such a beast. Smell research has come a long way, and
synthesizing odor is definitely possible in the laboratory now. I
assume that poison gas detectors are being worked on as well. Oxygen
generation should be pretty straightforward as well; if nothing else,
the Aromaker could have an oxygen tank internally for this purpose.
Package it all together into the friendly form factor of a dog, and I
think there's a definite market possibility here.
I won't inflict my poor attempts at drawing a dog upon you. Oh, and
apologies for the name. It was either that or "BioDog", and at least
this has some correlation with the dog's function.
Eric Nehrlich's WWW home page / nehrlich@alum.mit.edu