eyestrain
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Unlock YouTube's hidden Dark Mode to save your eyes
If you've ever tried to watch YouTube when it's dark out, you know that the typical bright white of the video service's page can be a bit blinding. Enter "Dark Mode," a hidden feature that turns the light surfaces black or dark gray so you can get on with those cat videos without all that glare.
Samsung studies 3D viewing discomfort, finds out bloggers don't read
Judging by the headlines today, Samsung's 3D R&D department made a huge mistake, just check them out: "Who Could Have Guessed: 3D Hurts Your Eyes", "Samsung-funded study finds 3D video causes extra eye strain, fatigue", "Samsung study finds that 3D video causes eye strain, fatigue". It seems obvious that Samsung's research grant financing a UC Berkeley study published in the Journal of Vision was wasted, except for one minor issue -- all of those headlines are wrong. "The zone of comfort: Predicting visual discomfort with stereo displays" is actually trying to find out why 3D-related eyestrain happens. That it can and does happen with poorly formatted video, whether 2D, 3D or otherwise, is already known. Scrolling down beyond the abstract reveals the prof's data actually indicated a wider comfort zone than 3D video producers commonly assumed with their percentage rule of thumb. It's a Friday night and you don't have to pick thumbing through dry descriptions of experiments over whatever your plans are, but that's why you have us. Shockingly, companies desperately hawking 3D tech are busy making it better instead of undermining their own products, but you'd have to actually read the study to find out for sure.
The Blaze Blink Now saves you from Computer Vision Syndrome, is always watching
Big Brother is watching you, and you'd better remember. Forget for just a moment and you could find yourself committing thoughtcrime doupleplusquick. Enter the £49.99 ($78) Blink Now. It's ostensibly a device designed to save you from Computer Vision Syndrome, a modern affliction that causes headaches and blurry vision among those who spend a little too much time basking in the glow of a CRT or LCD. But, we're thinking its purposes are rather more nefarious. It's basically just a little LCD that you hang in your monitor and connect via USB. It presents an eye, always looking at you, lazily and nonchalantly blinking. In theory, if you see an eye blinking you'll blink more often yourself and cut down on eye strain. In reality, the thinkpol is always watching and this is just another reminder.
Are portables killing our eyes?
As if we weren't already worried enough about our cellphone causing Blackberry thumb, certain indecisiveness, and, of course, brain cancer, the WSJ is now reporting that according to some leading opticians, portables, especially with small screens and smaller fonts, could be causing irreversible eye strain and damage to our vision. Apparently the action of focusing for long periods of time on small spacial areas held relatively closely to the body -- especially displays with poor contrast ratios, and bad glare -- tends to overwork the eye's ciliary muscles, and might be causing deteriorated vision in the same young group of patients now visiting doctors for other technologically related ailments, like portable audio related hearing loss -- a group far too young to be coming in for their annual eyes, ears, and artificial hip-bone checkup.[Via TechDirt]
