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Electronic Paper
Omega Prime writes: "The BBC has an article about the latest advances in E-Paper. That is, flexible display media that is both cheap and reuseable. The possibilities for this are endless, Can you say Holodeck wallpaper?" There's also an AP article. Do you ever get the feeling that electronic paper is going to be just around the corner for a long, long time?
I'll bet book publishers can't wait to get ahold of this stuff. Then they can bring in (joy!) digital rights management, so if you buy a normal looking book, you can only read it for two weeks before you have to "renew" your licence.
"If he thinks he can hide and run from the United States and our allies, he's sorely mistaken." Bush on bin Laden
This makes video possible. This is in contrast to other efforts, which have concentrated at static images with relatively slow refresh.
Also, the display is capable of displaying 256 shades of gray. This would make anti-aliased text possible.
Imagine having a roll-up video screen in your pda/laptop. You could have a pen-sized cylinder that is your pda and simply pull the screen out when you needed it.
Lasers Controlled Games!
Although flexible electronic display media may someday surpass paper's resolution and readability, it will never equal its absorbency.
The previous mental connection explains why I bust out in grins whenever someone mentions "the paperless office." The image of a pointy-haired boss beckoning pitifully from the executive washroom door comes to mind every time.
But neither of those, in my opinion, qualifies as "electronic paper". What distinguishes "electronic paper" from other kinds of displays is that it retains its contents even in the complete absence of power; with real "electronic paper" you only need power to change the display.
What do you need to manufacture large quantities of e-paper?
Since if it uses materials we only have limited amounts of, nothing is gained from an ecological perspective.
I suppose they use more lasting material(s) than wood, but which exactly?
Also, how does one recycle these papers? Do you just burn them? I guess you can just flash their memory, but due to human laziness, enormous amounts will probably be just thrown away, and there has to be a good way of taking care of this. We're, after all, talking about e-papers that may not be too uncommon if they get a breakthrough.
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
Electronic books and paper have been "just around the corner" for ages. How many times have we heard about this new break through which will make paper useless?
First off, paper is easily portable and fairly robust. Moreover, most people prefer to read from paper rather than from screen. This is due to the fact that conventional screens are just tiring for the eyes.
Also, paper is easy to use, and you can just write on printed paper and make marks in all the colours you have available to you. Easy stuff!
Cost is also an issue, e-paper is still way too expensive. Normal paper is cheap and cheerful.
While the reusability of e-paper is great, it's unclear for publishers how to create a good business model from it. People will be much more prone to copy e-books than normal books (ever seen anybody read a book on photocopied sheets of paper?) Thus, a good business model needs to deal with people copying things.
And people just like to hold some physical publication in their hands. Books, magazines, newspapers, printed paper just feels more real.
And finally, some documents need to be physical to have legal status.
These are all reasons why, even when technology wise e-paper is mature, society will not be leaping to accept it.
Why are we opposed to paper? For one thing, it has grave environmental costs. Even with all the recycling of paper (and most of it still gets thrown out), trees still need to get cut down to make virgin pulp, because paper has a limit to how many times it can be recycled (eventually the fibres break down). Not to mention the fact that rather nasty chemicals are used in its production. One may counter that the production of ePaper will involve equally nasty and toxic compounds (after all, electronics manufacturing is one of the dirtiest industries on the planet), but if I produce one unit that will last twenty years, I'm using fewer harmful chemicals than if I produce many millions of pieces of paper, and saving trees in the process. Ever since the advent of the electronic computer, the world's consumption of paper has increased exponentially -- meaning large swathes of virgin forest have to be cut down. This is a trend that NEEDS to be reversed or at least stopped dead in its tracks. I mean, get over it. The argument for the 'feel' of paper and all of that sentimental tosh is a strawman. If I had an ePaper medium that was easy on the eyes, I'd gladly abandon paper for it. Are you going to use the same sentimental argument about cuneiform? 'Boy, that new-fangled paper stuff just doesn't have the "feel" of chiselling into hard slate or granite. I need to keep my sanity by etching runes into this stone here.' Nonsense! If our ancestors could abandon the old in favour of the new, so could we.
'He who has to break a thing to find out what it is, has left the path of wisdom.' -- Gandalf to Saruman
What happens when documents can be changed at will, including copies already 'printed'? Orwell said: "He who controls the past controls the future. He who controls the present controls the past." If all documents a published on this stuff, a level of control becomes possible that was previously unthought of. Give me documents that are immutable, please.
"that's not encryption - it's a new perl script that I'm working on..." - from some Matrix parody