Transparent OLED rearview mirror both dazzles and distracts

Although we've been hearing about transparent OLEDs for years now, mum's been the word on an actual product. So far the focus has been on Germany, but it looks like some interesting things have been going down in Korea as well. Researchers at ETRI (the flexible OLED folks) have apparently applied for 51 patents both nationally and internationally for the tech, including one for a transparent oxide resistor that helps increase the aperture ratio of AMOLEDs. And while all this is going down, NeoView KOLON has unveiled a new prototype rearview mirror that utilizes a transparent OLED display for -- well, displaying things. Just be sure to keep your eyes on the road, eh?

Read - "Korean Researchers Develop Transparent Transistors OLED Displays"
Read - "Neoview Kolon transparent OLED prototype"

[(Unverified) Posted May 22nd 2009 7:46PM]

I would agree that the KOLON prototype looks to be a head down display (instrument cluster) rather than a rear-view mirror, the symbology would read upside down if this was a rear-view mirror intended display.
Great HUD idea from XTASI, only issue that I can see though is that a HUD using just this technology will cause shed loads of accidents, not because the information will be a destraction, otherwise fighter pilots would be ditching their aircraft all day long, but because the windscreen and the outside world are on different focal planes, you focus on the display and the other road users are only in your peripheral vision, you focus on the outside world and the HUD is useless. The reason why BMW HUDs and aircraft HUDs are so bulky is because they need expensive optics and mirrors to collimate the image, so when it reaches the screen it is alreay focused accross the whole range (viewer to screen & viewer to outside world/infinity).
However - There are applications where the viewer does not sit so close to the screen, such as in ships bridges & cranes and trains where this technology could be really useful and relatively cheap because the HUD and the outside world would be on the same focal plane as the human eye.