Flashers

The future no doubt holds many incredible product applications - and there are probably going to be some that are more annoying than others. Imagine wandering down the supermarket aisle in search of your favourite cereal - only to have the packages flashing advertising at you! Or maybe it will be a poisons warning on prescription medicine packaging.
And this is not that far away. Electronics maker Siemens is readying a paper-thin electronic-display technology which is so cheap it could replace conventional labels on disposable packaging, from milk cartons to boxes of Cheerios (mmm Cheerios).
As if parents doing the shopping with children don't have it hard enough, an engineer with Siems said: "When kids see flashing pictures on cereal boxes we don't expect them to just ask for the product, but to say, 'I want it.'" (Add a couple of exclamation points!)
To read more about the technology, visit the Wired report for fuller details.
Although the application is currently talking about "flashing" rather than videos, I can't help but think that one day we will be watching short "videos" on packaging. And then it's only a short sideways step to the photos I dream about - with a few seconds of moving footage on a printed image. I think I remember that Kodak had developed something like this - but I haven't seen anything about it nor seen that it is commercially available.