Soulja Boy was ahead of his time when he came out with the song “Kiss Me Thru The Phone”. From the Imagineering Lab in London comes the Kissenger. The Kissenger is the world’s first mobile kiss messenger and is an attempt to solve the physical intimacy problems of long-distance relationships.
The Kissenger uses various sensors and actuators embedded under a silicon lip to mimic a kiss. The sensors and actuators calculate the pressure of the user’s lips to create a customized kiss. The device is paired with a messenger app available only for iOS. The device is plugged into the audio jack of your iPhone, which is unfortunate because Apple just removed the audio jack with the iPhone 7. It’s okay, I’m sure there’s a dongle for that.
Long-distance relationships are tough. I’ve watched friends in long-distance relationships talk to each other everyday via FaceTime as their only means of spending time with each other. I actually walked in on my roommate who had fallen asleep with his hand out FaceTiming his girlfriend. I find it laughable that kissing a silicon lip will make me feel closer to my significant other. “Hey babe, I miss you. Let me share an intimate moment with you by sending a kiss through robotic lips that are made of the same material as my phone case.”
The icing on the cake comes from the Kissenger website, which states this device is for fans, “to connect idols and their fans from all around the world”. I can’t imagine any celebrity agreeing to send kisses so that random people can feel what it’s like to kiss their favorite celebrity. I find this concept to be incredibly creepy and a terrible way to market this product. This sounds like something geared towards creepy, single people looking to get a little bit of action similar to this scene in Big Bang Theory.