SeanBuckley
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The once-bright future of color e-paper
It's all too easy to dismiss the optimistic fantasies of yesterday: flying cars and robot servants may have filled the pages of Popular Mechanics in the 1950s, but today we're better grounded in reality, pinning our hopes on more reasonable futures based on technology we've actually developed. Still, even those predictions fall flat sometimes, and it can burn to look back at the track record of a horse we once bet on. For this editor, that stallion was known as color e-paper, a series of dimly hued electronic-paper technologies that teased a future of low-power gadgets with beautiful, sunlight-readable matte displays. Prototypes from half a dozen firms exhibited tantalizing potential for the last half of the 2000s, and then promptly vanished as the decade came to a close. Like many ill-conceived futurist predictions, expectations for this technology gently faded from the consumer hive mind. The legacy of color e-paper may be muted and dim, but its past, at least, is black-and-white: monochrome E Ink set the tone for a decade of reflective, low-power displays. Years before the iPad and other tablets created the so-called third device, sunlight-readable E Ink screens nested into the public consciousness with Amazon's inaugural Kindle. Launched in 2007, it was a blocky, expensive and awkward device that had more potential than practical application, but the visibility of the Amazon brand lifted its stature. Consumers paid attention and the e-reader category was forged.
IRL: Blue Mics Yeti, Western Digital My Passport and Razer's Naga Hex gaming mouse
Welcome to IRL, an ongoing feature where we talk about the gadgets, apps and toys we're using in real life and take a second look at products that already got the formal review treatment. It's been a busy week for tech writers. Capping out a week populated by not one, not two, but three smartphone reviews, we're happy to take a breather and return our attention to life's littler pleasures. Like USB mics and portable 2TB hard drives. And also, gaming mice.
Growing Up Geek: Sean Buckley
Welcome to Growing Up Geek, an ongoing feature where we take a look back at our youth and tell stories of growing up to be the nerds that we are. Today, we have our very own Associate Editor, Sean Buckley. The hardest question I was ever asked as a kid was "What do you want to be when you grow up?" When the boys all cried "Fireman!" and the girls unanimously pledged their life to marine biology, I came up short. Growing up? I hadn't planned on that. Peter Pan complex (and book collection) aside, I had it as good as any boy during the 80s / 90s split. I grew-up in the pre-internet stone age, when the world was still a mystery that couldn't be Wiki'd away. Playground rumors went without debunk, and wild stories ran amok across the schoolyard -- pixies in England, aliens in New Mexico, and magical robot cars in Japan. The world was a fantastic, impossible place. It still is, but I'd be lying if I said the finality of reality isn't a small disappointment compared to the lies I loved as a child. With the information superhighway still under construction, I had to find other ways to spend my summers. Sure, countless hours were wasted well spent saving 8-bit princesses (and the world of course), but the best weeks of summer were had at Boy Scout camp, the County Fair, and trudging across the country on family road trips.
