Siemens USA - Wafer-Thin Color Displays for Packaging

terrywfrazier@gmail.com — Fri, 14 Oct 2005 02:50:02 GMT

Another development in the eInk/e-paper arena, scientists at Siemens have unveiled technology for thin, disposable, color displays that can be used on packages to show instructions, different langauges, etc. The switching rate of the technology is even fast enough to show moving pictures.

Siemens USA - Wafer-Thin Color Displays for Packaging
[...] At the Plastics Electronics trade fair in Frankfurt, Siemens developers exhibited extremely thin, miniature color displays that can be printed onto paper or foil. And the displays can be produced at very low cost compared to LCD panels. The first displays will become available on the market in 2007.

The displays show information about products, or even operating instructions for devices, directly on the packaging. A pillbox, for example, could display instructions for how it should be taken and provide this information in several languages with the push of a button. Admission tickets for trade shows could indicate the booths where various exhibitors are located. Itâs also conceivable that small computer games will be on packages or that equipment boxes will display animations that give users step-by-step operating instructions when a button is pushed. [...]

Currently, Siemens is developing technology to create the displays by printing them, powering them with printable batteries and, potentially, printable antennas that draw power from a small radio transmitter on the shelf. The displays are said to be environmentally friendly for disposal.

HP Time-limits Ink Cartridges

terrywfrazier@gmail.com — Thu, 01 May 2003 15:36:39 GMT

Tag this one with the Lexmark DMCA case, as a logical attempt to extend control, and hence profits, to the greatest reach legally possible. The problem is the DMCA extends this control well beyond previously legal ends by stopping any form of competition or modification that would bypass any of HP's digital intellectual property. It's only a matter of time before HP joins the DMCA legal chorus to enforce its rights under this new industrial monopoly grant.

Whole industries -- aftermarket auto parts, aftermarket printer cartridges, memory chips, manufacturers of any performance mechanical parts, radio and computer hobbyists, and others -- could well be destroyed by a few oligopolies embedding sufficient DigIP into their products to make them immune to any form of competition.

I don't see why it would take anything more than simple RFID embedding to establish a DMCA-qualified barrier to modification. Within a few years companies could be embedding inexpensive RFID tags into every conceivable part, linking them to a DMCA-protected control system that stops operation unless all parts are identified as OEM equipment.

Whose law trumps in such a case -- restraint of trade or DMCA?

theinquirer.net - HP inkjet cartridges have built-in expiry dates.
PRINTER GIANT HP has built in time limits for its inkjet printer cartridges which means machines may stop working even if the consumable has 75% ink let to go

[ ... ]

HP has told him that the date printed on the ink cartridge is not the expiry date, and that is determined either by a cartridge being in the printer for 30 months, or the cartridge is 4.5 years old, whichever comes first. [...]
[Privacy Digest]

b.cognosco

Siemens USA - Wafer-Thin Color Displays for Packaging

Siemens USA - Wafer-Thin Color Displays for Packaging

HP Time-limits Ink Cartridges