The future is not now — it’ll be here in September

 Posted by on 20 August 2009  Modern Life
Aug 202009
 

Apart from hover-bikes, the only thing I will accept as proof that the future has arrived is video embedded in traditionally paper products.  I’m talking about Harry Pottereque moving pictures in newspapers, magazines…heck, even on cereal boxes. 

As of this moment, a quick perusal of any newstand reveals that the future is not here (for the record, there isn’t a hover-bike in my garage either).  The BBC tells me, however, that the future will arrive in September in select copies of Entertainment Weekly.

The first clips will preview programmes from US TV network CBS and show adverts by the drinks company Pepsi.

They will appear in 18 September editions of the magazine distributed in Los Angeles and New York.

These “special editions”, as I’m sure they’ll be called, will likely cost a fair amount more than their purely paper counterparts.  They will also be thicker and have a battery life of about 70 minutes.

I would say that this product is 100% awesome, but for some reason, the idea of a magazine with a battery life gives me a stomach ache.

T. Keith Edmunds

  • http://www.absurdintellectual.com/ Grant Hamilton

    I heard about this … and as cool as the newspapers from Harry Potter or Minority Report look, what gives me the screaming heebie jeebies is thinking about how this will be used for *spit* advertising.

    I do not want to be sitting on the crapper with a nice magazine, only to turn the page and have some pitchman yelling at me, trying to sell me products and services. No No No.

  • Stumpy

    This would be sorta cool if the electronics used in these fancy new magazines were recycled from our discarded media devices, like the electronics that we buy and pay an environmental charge for. I don’t know about you guys, but it’s weirdly difficult around these parts to find an electronics recycler that won’t charge me money to give them my junk.

  • http://pennywise-books.blogspot.com/ T. Keith Edmunds

    Aw, c’mon. You had to know this kind of technology would be used by marketers first. They make their money back on it, it becomes more common, then cheaper and it eventually taken up for other, less profitable ventures.

    My worry deals with the recycling and e-waste issue. We won’t be able to recycle these magazines as regular paper, so many people will eventually just throw them out. Can you imagine all the nasty goo that will be eventually leaching into the soil and waterways?

  • Stumpy

    Yup! I predict that it will be a tough sell. Enviro groups will be livid, and the majority of consumers will have a tough time justifying paying more money for a magazine with a moving picture inside, when we can get it for free on our desktops and laptops. It’ll have to be greenwashed as part of the recycling economy to be picked up in any meaningful way.