Okay, honestly, we're all in agreement that this just looks completely weird and unsettling right?

A Japanese professor has developed a prototype lickable TV screen that can imitate food flavours, another step towards creating a multi-sensory viewing experience.

The device, called Taste the TV (TTTV), uses a carousel of 10 flavour canisters that spray in combination to create the taste of a particular food. The flavour sample then rolls on hygienic film over a flat TV screen for the viewer to try.

Oh really, "hygienic film"? We're going to be licking some kinda "spray" off of "hygienic film"? Is that right?

Of course, like so much that is bad and awful in the world today, we owe this one to COVID:

In the COVID-19 era, this kind of technology can enhance the way people connect and interact with the outside world, said Meiji University professor Homei Miyashita.

"The goal is to make it possible for people to have the experience of something like eating at a restaurant on the other side of the world, even while staying at home," he said.

Oh okay I get it. Rather than actually visit that Michelin-starred restaurant in Catalonia and enjoying a world-class dining experience in all its glorious taste and texture and atmosphere, you can just stay at home and, you know, lick a screen.

What an exciting new way of dining!