Sony unveils tiny film-thin TV screen that bends

[MililaniBuckeye]

Looks like Sony has become a flat-screen player again...

Sony touts tiny, film-thin TV screen that bends

TOKYO, Japan (AP) -- In the race for ever-thinner displays for TVs,
cell phones and other gadgets, Sony may have developed one to
beat them all -- a razor-thin display that bends like paper
while showing full-color video.

Sony Corp. released video of the new 2.5-inch display Friday. In it,
a hand squeezes a display that is 0.3 millimeters, or 0.01 inch,
thick. The display shows color images of a bicyclist stuntman and
a picturesque lake.

Although flat-panel TVs are getting slimmer, a display that's so thin
it bends in a human hand marks a breakthrough.

Full story

 

[Deety]

Seems to be slow going... I remember articles from before 2000 about roll-up screens being out in 3-4 years... here's one from 2002.

 

[Taosman]

Sony, once the world leader in electronic innovation, has gotten so big, it can't get out of it's own corporate way.
Beta Max, SACD, now Blu-ray, the list goes on and on. Great basic ideas,
destroyed by corporate infighting and indecision.

Apple is showing the world how to be inovative and corporate decisive.

 

[sandgk]

Taos, I would say you are right about Sony in the first sentence, partially right about Sony in the second, not wholly right about Apple at the end.

Sony has become too big to get out of it's own way.

True, BetaMax was a market failure, but it pointed the way to finally popularizing the true home movie, plus it heralded this TiVO'd society of ours which now exists. SACD was a bad idea period, not an example being simply too big. Doomed once conceived it was implemented with a complete lack of finesse.
Blu-Ray on the other hand is another story. Unlike Beta-Max, post-PS3 it leads the market in both installed units and breadth of film library. Which library falls into Sony's hands as a result of the more recently acquired media interests. This actually may be the one time that the "big idea" strategy of the studios product in the hands of Sony, and Sony owning widely adopted hardware to play said media, actually pays off.

They'd better make the most of it because like I said earlier, I agree, Sony is too big to get out of their way.

As for Apple I think they do innovate, but just with nowhere near the vision they once employed. I think instead that the current success of Apple is much more due to market targeting than any other strength. They are taking very well established technologies and integrating them. Then, they apply the one piece of corporate skill at which they truly shine.

They make it easy to use and look nice.


Apple is corporately decisive, but I think, these days, we flatter them when talking of Apple as innovators.

All of which doesn't answer where we started with this. Which was that we were reminded (thanks Deety) of the earlier innovations in this area in 2002.

My question to that is what happened to Universal Display Corporation? Shouldn't they be raking in big coin by now?

 

[Taosman]

PlayStation 3 can't hide its flaws
Sony's new video game system is a workhorse, but there's something missing.
http://money.cnn.com/2006/11/15/commentary/ps3_review/index.htm

Game Over is a regular column by Chris Morris
November 21 2006: 12:20 PM EST

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- With its Cell processor engine, Blu-Ray DVD drive and beefy hard drive, the PlayStation 3 is unquestionably a powerhouse of a video game system. And forget about Elmo, this is the item that consumers will be sparring over as the holidays get closer.
But cut through the hype, and the desire for the newest, flashiest gadget and the product is not as compelling as it might seem. The PS3, for all its power, feels incomplete at launch. And that could leave some consumers, who have shelled out $500 or $600 for the system, depending on the configuration they choose, feeling put out.
: Fall of Man" is among the most visually spectacular of the PS3's launch titles.more video game news and commentary? Click the orc.The potential for greatness is certainly there, but there are fundamental mistakes in execution that prove annoying. Take the initial user experience, for example: When you bought a PlayStation 2, it was a pretty simple process. You paid the store, took the PS2 home, plugged it in and started playing. Things aren't so simple this time.
Once you've plugged in and configured your PS3, you'll have to update the system software. Some (but not all) launch games will include that system update, which means the process will take 5 minutes or so. If not, you'll download and install the upgrade from the internet (as I did). This method takes more than 10 minutes. It's frustrating, especially having spent this much.
The money does buy something: The PS3 is the first system to fulfill the promise of being a true digital centerpiece of the living room. There's little you can't do with it. Watch high-definition movies. Listen to music. Surf the Internet. Chat with friends. And, naturally, play games.
Those system updates allow Sony (Charts) to add functionality down the road. The PSP portable gaming system Sony introduced last year has benefited greatly from system upgrades and there's every reason to believe the PS3 will as well. (But they're still a pain for day one users.)
The dashboard menu structure is similar to the PSP's. Navigating between the areas that let you launch a game, movie or music, along with the Sony Network (the online service which allows you to download trailers and buy add-ons for games) is all pretty easy.
The only part that could cause confusion for some is the settings field. If nothing else, Sony is thorough in letting you choose how you want to set up your PS3 -- but there's such a thing as TOO thorough. Quick: do you want your audio CD output frequency to be 48 kHz or 44.1 kHz? You get the point.
Eye Candy
Graphically, the PS3 is a tour de force. No, not better than Microsoft's Xbox --yet. But you quickly sense the greater potential of the PS3. It will ultimately be a question of how long it takes developers to learn to exploit what the system has to offer.
If you've got a high definition set, you're certainly in for a treat. And if you're one of the few to have a TV with 1080p high-def resolution, you'll be in heaven. 1080p is the PS3's sweet spot. It's the most detailed video available today -- and PS3 games plan to make the most of it. Launch title "NBA 07" is the best initial example, with detail as fine as the pores on player's skin. But expect no visual detail to be too minor.
For the majority of owners, though - those who only have a regular TV set - it's a slightly different story. The PS3 still looks good, but not awe-inspiring. Ultimately, it's a matter of the software. "Resistance: Fall of Man," for instance, looks fine in regular resolution. Electronic Arts' (Charts) "Need for Speed: Carbon"? Not so much.
Controlling games is pretty close to what PlayStation veterans are used to. The major shift this time is Sony has included a motion sensor in its controller (which has been redubbed the Sixaxis). In "NBA 07," for instance, twisting the controller will let you juke around an opposing player.
The problem is that the motion doesn't feel natural here, as it does with the Nintendo Wii. Perhaps as developers get more used to the feature, they'll be better able to incorporate it into their games. Initially, though, you get the impression they were caught off guard when the feature was announced -- and rushed to find some way to include it.
Gone also is the rumble effect from the controller -- an omission that has upset many Sony loyalists. Personally, I miss the shaking. The feeling of a slight rumble in your hands as you fired a virtual weapon added to the fun.
As for the much-touted Blu-Ray disc player, it's a nice addition, but it's almost immaterial if you don't have a top-of-the-line television set. For standard TV owners, it's just a player for more expensive movies -- and likely won't appeal. But it could be an ace up the PS3's sleeve in the years to come.

 

[Taosman]

Dave Zeiler of the Baltimore Sun's online sunspot.net site interviewed me for a column on what he called "the continuing saga of how Apple?s fresh ideas sooner or later get hijacked by the Wintel crowd and re-sold as a Microsoft or Intel ?innovation.?"

Dave quoted only a few lines of my rather extensive email interview in his article, so I thought I'd reproduce the entire text here.
Dave asked: "Do you think this is true, or is Apple?s role as tech innovator exaggerated?" I replied: Success always has a thousand fathers. Neither Apple nor Microsoft invented many of the technologies that they brought to prominence. So "innovator" in that sense is perhaps exaggerated. But what Apple does so well is to realize the potential in a technology, and to frame it in such a way that people discover that they need it. In a way, they are cultural innovators more than they are tech innovators. They have a really great sense of where technology is going. Microsoft's slogan "Where do you want to go today?" may be apposite -- Apple is great at asking "Where do you want to go tomorrow?" and helping to take the industry there. Apple tends to be a market innovator, while Microsoft is a fast follower, delivering that next generation of technology to a wider audience.
http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/wlg/3246

 

[Taosman]

Apple and Innovation
Then again, maybe Jobs has just gotten used to being tossed out of his own parties. You could say that the personal-computer industry itself began as an Apple wingding when the Cupertino, California-based company introduced the Apple II in 1977. Ever since, Apple has played the role of generous host, spicing up the festivities with one tasty offering after another. Following the PC, Apple served up many of the features that computer users have since come to take for granted, including the graphical user interface, the mouse, the laser printer, and the color monitor. Yet Apple has been forced to watch the celebrations from out in the alley, its nose pressed longingly to the window as others feast: Today, more than a quarter-century after its founding, it commands just 2% of the $180 billion worldwide market for PCs. Almost everyone agrees that Apple's products are not only trailblazers but also easier to use, often more powerful, and always more elegant than those of its rivals. Yet those rivals have followed its creative leads and snatched for themselves the profits and scale that continually elude Apple's grasp.


All of which raises some interesting questions. If Apple is really the brains of the industry--if its products are so much better than Microsoft's or Dell's or IBM's or Hewlett-Packard's--then why is the company so damned small? (Consider that in the last 10 years alone, Apple has been issued 1,300 patents, almost one-and-a- half times as many as Dell and half as many as Microsoft--which earns 145 times as much money.)

TRUTH IS, SOME OF THE MOST INNOVATIVE INSTITUTIONS IN THE HISTORY OF AMERICAN BUSINESS HAVE BEEN COLOSSAL FAILURES.​

The Creativity Conundrum

Conventional wisdom has long answered that Apple is the victim of a single, huge strategic error: the decision in the 1970s not to license its operating system. But that was long ago and far away. Apple has since had many opportunities to reverse its infamous decision, but it hasn't done so. And Apple's creativity has produced plenty of other opportunities to compensate for the initial misstep. The company could, for example, have exploited an early beachhead in the $12 billion education market for PCs (it once dominated that market but now can claim only 10% of it), to push its way back into homes. But it failed to develop the aggressive sales force to do so. Apple has missed chances to own new markets, too. It introduced the world to pen-based computing with its Newton mobile device in 1993. Newton had its problems--it was clunky, hard to use, and probably ahead of its time. But it still seems baffling that Apple failed to capture a meaningful stake in the $3.3 billion market for personal digital assistants (PDAs), a business that by some measures is now growing faster than either mobile phones or PCs.
That Apple has been frozen out time and again suggests that its problems go far beyond individual strategic missteps. Jobs may have unwittingly put his finger on what's wrong during his keynote speech earlier that day in Paris. "Innovate," he bellowed from the stage. "That's what we do." He's right--and that's the trouble. For most of its existence, Apple has devoted itself single-mindedly, religiously, to innovation.
But wait. ...................
http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/78/jobs.html