Like, it is something you'll want, no need to have

Yes, folks line up and wait for it. Hasbro, the toy company, based in my old hometown of Pawtucket, RI is coming out with a musical tooth brush.

Now, why would you want one of those? Fair question.

Thanks to Brand Autopsy for the posting and for the answers:

"When pressed to the tooth, [Tooth Tunes] renders a recorded riff from a pop star that lasts two- minutes precisely the amount of time dentists say children should be spend brushing their teeth." [source: Wall Street Journal article sub req'd.]

Not only does it make the ho-hum toothbrush remarkable, it also solves the problem of getting children to brush their teeth more often and for longer periods of time. "

Now, I must admit that dentists and I do not get along too well. They are not very high on my places to visit. The last time there, the hygienist suggested that I get a powered tooth brush. Not particularly fancy, battery powered would be sufficient. This would be just enough to help fight the plaque I seem to accumulate. So I moved up into the powered world of tooth brushes. I keep my manual brush handy. It won't run out of battery power.

And along comes this. With music!

The integration of technology into a device like this to solve a problem like this simply intrigues me. Why didn't I think of it?


Parent in not so distant future: Johnny, go brush your teeth. I want to hear Beethoven twice!
Michael or Jane: Can I listen to (insert your favorite child pop star) instead?
Same Parent: Yes, as long as I hear it twice!


Of course, the questions that now remain for me are as follows:

1. How long will it take for a cheap knock off to hit the market?
2. How long will it take for someone to hack the device so that they can down load from their iPod Shuffle?
3. or better yet, play from their iPod?

Do you have any questions?

Or answers to these?

Updated: From BoingBoing, Cory Doctrow writes of an acoustic hack to the iPod, sort of stepping in the right direction as suggested here.