Although I'm not a true gadgethead, I do appreciate the complete and utter feast that this week's Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas must proffer for the gizmologically inclined.
One CES-launched item (advanced prototypes, at least) that caught my attention was the handheld, battery-powered pico projector, code named SHOW and made by the folks at Microvision, which sports a MEMS micromirror-enabled laser projector in a form factor similar to an iPod.
What does it do? It projects small to large, high-rez, always-in-focus images onto any surface (depending on lighting conditions and projection distance, of course).
Although at first glance this looks like one mighty cool little device---and a potentially multibillion-dollar killer app (goodbye, expensive flat screen TVs?)---it also makes me uneasy with what might happen when such superminiature projection devices become as ubiquitous as--and components of---camera phones, digital music players, laptops, PDAs, and other portables.
Are you really ready for this?
Let your imagination run wild for a bit. Everywhere people now plug in their earbuds, poke at their handhelds' keyboards, watch DVDs, check the Web on their phones or laptops, or plug into an alternate gaming reality, add another serious feature to all those devices. Family photos and videos, gaming images, latest DVDs, music performances, and Web imagery will be projectible on any surface that is handy. The inside and outside of buildings, sides and interiors of cars, waiting rooms in airports and hospitals, bars and restaurants, hillsides---the list is pretty much endless.
Having fun with your microprojector at home is one thing, but do you really want to be surrounded and bombarded, in public or semipublic places, by images of Aunt Betsy's new house, gangsta rap videos, "Grand Theft Auto," stupid teenager tricks, Yahoo Finance, YouTube, amateur and professional porn, bad Hollywood movies....You get the picture(s). Plus, there's no guarantee the accompanying sound will necessarily be channeled into headphones or buds either. And the thought of people driving while screwing around with their PicoSHOW? Now that's disturbing.
The use of the current crop of personal devices may sometimes perturb others, but when everyone's gadget has a microprojector in it, and those little buggers are being used by seemingly everyone you're sharing space with, the consequences elicit a certain amount of dread and foreboding in this anything-but-Luddite reporter.
Remember the days when cellphone and iPod etiquette were nonexistent? And it's not as if they've improved all that much. Imagine the serious consequences, potential conflicts, and sheer annoyance factor caused by the widespread---and clueless---use of portable microprojectors.
Scary, very scary.
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