A Light Solution To Long Distance Relationships
A Scottish company has invented a light-based device to make LDRs more tolerable.
You know who knows how to fix a problem? The Scottish. They're just not as well-known for it because they generally don't let things get to the "problem" level and when they do they bring in the big guns: English getting 'em down? They bring in Rob Roy (or William Wallace, I guess). Ladies don't think you're sexy? Call in Rod Stewart (definitely not Michael McDonald). And if you absolutely have to get Birnam Wood to high Dunsinane to avenge your father's foul murder? Holler at your boy MacDuff (please forget Donalbain entirely). That's why I'm not surprised that the Scots are on the cutting edge of salvaging long-distance relationships (LDRs).
Per the BBC, a company called Distance Labs (in Moray) is testing a device called Mutsugoto that employs an array of computers, cameras, lights and touch-sensitive rings (there are probably cogs from Cogswell and sprockets from Spacely in there somewhere) to give a sensation to a partner lying miles apart.
Check out BBC for the gory details, but the punch line is the device syncs movement and light and superimposes them on the other user. And, cha-ching, things get interesting when the light patterns cross paths (not "total protonic reversal").
The theory is that the matched sensation(s) will foster a closeness that belies the physical gulf. While the technology isn't going to dethrone naughty Skype-ing or webcam show-and-tell, it is super cool (if not trippily remenicent of the sex scene from the classic Demolition Man). (Hopefully, none of us will ever have to learn what to do with those shells.)
I would bet that this product (once the equipment is reduced in price and magnitude) would catch on very quickly with the shut-in set looking for a quick thrill with some online peepshow mamacita. And forget about it when the ravers get this thing, warehouse clubs will be a thing of the past. Until then, we'll have to let the Howard Hugheses and the hikikomori test drive this Mutsugoto.
Note: Tomfoolery does not condone the ridicule of agoraphobics or the Scottish.
