What is the next 'big thing' in entertainment units/media? Is there anything planned after DVD Players/DVD's??
Roll Up for the Floppy Television LONDON (Reuters) - First they went wider, then flatter, and now televisions are set to go floppy. Roll-up, flexible televisions, akin to the melting watches of Salvador Dali's surreal landscapes, have become possible thanks to a glowing plastic compound perfected in the laboratories of Britain's Cambridge Display Technology (CDT). Roll-up televisions will allow viewers of the future to flip their sets out of sight like projector screens and will come with a similar price tag to bulkier boxes. The technology stems from the discovery in 1989 of the compound p-phenylenevinylene which glows greeny-yellow when given an electric charge. A little tweaking over the following decade produced compounds to emit blue and red light: the roll-up TV was born. The market for light emitting screens is expected to grow from $20-25 million in 2000 to over $3 billion by 2005, and CDT's Light Emitting Polymer (LEP) screens are expected to grab a majority chunk of that. "I think it (commercial production) is very close now," said Fyfe, adding that the last bottleneck -- finding a flexi-screen that protects the sensitive compounds from corrosion by oxygen and water vapour -- had almost been overcome. "Realistically, you will see roll up displays around 2004 or 2005," he added. "Just four weeks ago Philips demonstrated an all plastic display -- an incredible thing -- a device only a fifty millionth of an inch thick," said Fyfe. "If you can get thin enough plastic, then you would indeed have a roll-up television." The Japanese giants of television manufacturing, Sony, Hitachi and Toshiba, are leading the race to put the technology to use, but not far behind is the military, which envisions roll-up maps of the battlefield fed by overhead satellites. "They're interested in every ounce that can be saved from a soldier's pack," said Fyfe. With the flick of a switch the display could convert to infra-red for covert night operations. On the home front, TV-watches, giant animated billboards, and a new wave of roll-up battery rechargers are just some of the applications in the pipeline. "I think we'll see a lot of innovation," said Fyfe. "People are talking about weaving displays into clothing. Will there ever be a mass market for that? I doubt it. But it will probably be seized on by someone."
I believe our era is advancing faster then any other era, ever. I mean Roll up televisons, Cloning, a BBS for Rockets fans. Wouldn't one say those three alone boost our rating to above the 2nd place era in advancing
I'm not sure what you'd consider our era, but if you mean something like the 70's or 80's and onward, think about the period from about 1890's - 1950s. Let's see : The car The plane The television The radio The electronic computer Space exploration Nuclear energy Those are some monumental advancements in a period of roughly 60 years, and I'm probably leaving something obvious off.
It is just a little disturbing to realize that knowledge is growing exponentially while wisdom is not.
In response to the question, I think DVD will be the standard for a long time to come. Too much R&D has been expended by the companies to let it die anytime soon. Not to mention that a DVD recorder will likely replace your VCR within the next 2 to 3 years as they go down in price and they'll add a feature to record TV programs.
I was reading a gaming magazine the other day, and the editor wrote the following: "....imagine if cars had developed at the same speed in the last twenty years as game consoles had. We'd all be shooting around in flying cars!" It may not be 100% true, but it's good to think about.
What's after DVD?? micro sized dvd.... if they can make CD technology this small, dvd technology is right around the corner.... maybe?
wasn't this on the original Mission Impossible movie? or maybe it was Eraser. One of those movies had the main character (Cruise or Williams) storing some stolen data on a mini-CD... i always wondered where that technology went... those movies are pretty old!
Actually archeologists have found that in the days before Abram, later known in the Bible, Quran, and Talmud as Abraham, in the land of Ur where his father was an idol maker... that civilization had indoor plumbing, a city sewer network, complete with clean running water to the house and waste water out. Ancient writings, such as the Bible all indicate "there is nothing new under the sun"... What trips me out is that basically since some early discoveries around 1890-1910 from electricity, and fuel technologies, automobiles... everything is basically just infinitely being evolved into a smaller, faster, more efficient, less thought on the part of the consumer, machines that take individuality and the challenges of mass thought and cognitive process out of the picture. In other words, if we don't watch out, everything gets so easy and super controllable until there are no reasons to question society's turns and changes as long as we're all comfortable. Will sports, and simple personal education goals be the only physical and mental challenge when everything has become so convenient that we need only enter codes, or push a button to be satisfied? Or will all of this continually be a pipe dream that we never reach due to man's inability to live in true peace toward the goal of Utopia? I say the latter. Too many basic human rights issues emerge to the forefront of many individuals collective minds when we worry about which new comfort providing, entertainment nerve quenching, gadgetry will evolve out of some "research" labratory. Roll up TV's, mini DVD's and any computer that does what your thinking before you verbalize it will not solve man's need for spiritual identity, physical nourshment, and mental challenge. In one sense it's all still a quest for fire... in another sense it's avoiding the meaning of the quest.
