CLEARink, latest news

[leebase]

Come on folks. People aren’t going blind reading on lcd tablets. LCD tablets are why eInk has plateaued and why color eInk remains “coming real soon”. And color eInk isn’t going to be cheaper than lcd's. The education system ANYWHERE is not going to usher in the long awaited color eInk era.

The reason CLEARInk is talking like they do is in the VAIN attempt to define a market where their product is needed and which LCD wouldn’t already meet the need. Ergo, really sunny climates with poor access to electricity. It’s ludicrous. It’s not going to happen.

You heard it here first

[rcentros]

Originally Posted by leebase

Come on folks. People aren’t going blind reading on lcd tablets.

Nope. Since I'm not reading on LCD tablets I'm not going blind by reading on them. But I have no interest in CLEARink either. If some folks want CLEARink color, though ... more power to them. More choices are good.

[Hrafn]

This comment from The Digital Reader comes to mind:

But they're still 6 months to a year away from going into production, according to the video. That's essentially the same state the tech was in around this time in 2017, when it was supposed to go into production later that year, and that was the same report we heard in 2018, when they promised to be in production in 2019.[link]

Speaking for myself, I'll take ClearInk seriously when they actually start production, not before.

[mdp]

Originally Posted by leebase

People aren’t going blind reading on lcd tablets

How do you know? In fact, given your statements, you suggest having wasted your sight to a point of not being able to see that LCD is inadequate.

You should have noticed that nowadays a large amount of marketing managers and designers are increasingly partial to worshiping satan. A web page using "font-weight: 300; color: #666;" *will* make you blind. Even, of course, in the comfort of your 26'' desktop, calibrated lighting, controlled environment (in normative theory). That it does make you blind infinitesimally means nothing, not just because "infinitesimal times by infinite equals definite", but chiefly because you are supposed to be able to notice perceptually (feedback) and intellectually that the eyes ain't happy.

The same goes for reading on the vastest majority (read: "all") of the electronic devices I have used. None of them can fully eliminate reflection. That you read on a device and even a minor shade of the background is visible is not good for your sight (and more). Currently, I am actually using a laptop with a big black umbrella facing its screen to achieve decency of visual quality - local optimality, not certified adequacy.

And this given, the basics reiterated ad nauseam remain:
-- LCD technology fights environmental light, which is at most a patchy solution: reflective uses environmental light, which is ceteris paribus clearly better;
-- TIR technology is power conservative when compared to LCD, which is certainly an important advantage;
-- LCD implementations are clearly not "use anywhere" oriented, while CLEARink is focusing on portability, which is a very sensible direction.* **

*While, I must note, many manufacturers are selling, literally, mirrors - what was used to fool aboriginals. That were not so fool to start writing on them.

**(EDIT: "sensible" for a market that probably does not involve you, so accept it that you have no use for skydiving equipment if you like the sea or scuba if you are soluble or whatever and realize it and leave divers be)

Originally Posted by leebase

LCD tablets are why eInk has plateaued

Again you are referencing a market that you are interested in referencing, as in a "strawman". As I suggested, many people nowadays are reading on mirrors: that does not make them a parameter (that makes them a non-parameter) - only for certain "marketing" people. In fact, "people" have probably never, nowhere been a normative parameter. It normally takes psychologists to appear to assume that.

Originally Posted by leebase

And color eInk isn’t going to be cheaper than lcd's

What are you talking about? This is TIR, not E-Ink. TIR should be cheaper than E-Ink and reasonably close to LCD.

Originally Posted by leebase

The education system ANYWHERE is not going to usher in the long awaited color eInk era

What are you taking about? Some education systems are reported to have expressed interest in better display technologies. Which is, well, UNSURPRISING, as an understatement.

Originally Posted by leebase

The reason CLEARInk is talking like they do is in the VAIN attempt to define a market where their product is needed and which LCD wouldn’t already meet the need. Ergo, really sunny climates with poor access to electricity. It’s ludicrous. It’s not going to happen

The market is there: hi there, here's a piece. You insist in claiming a position similar to "Here in Oslo I never felt the need for a convertible". LCD implementations certainly do not meet the need for what I do - they are barely adequate but certainly not optimal -, this is a statement, so you are insisting on denying the obvious and the witnessed.

Sunny climates are half of the world. Here is one, and very (post-)industrialized. Poor access to electricity means, at a glance, 99-point-whatever% of the land: if you do not leave your house, your own personal matter.

[mdp]

Originally Posted by Hrafn

This comment from The Digital Reader comes to mind:

Speaking for myself, I'll take ClearInk seriously when they actually start production, not before.

In those notes, Nate disregarded all of the non-technical progresses - and even the technical ones, so logically he disregarded everything - that make production closer.

And, with all due respect, I think and feel that you (happening to be the commenter) or many others taking CLEARink seriously or not will not dent reality much.

If the message is "don't hold your breath", well, in a world where "Don't dry the cat in the microwave" saves feline lives a number of people probably will be spared of asphyxiation.

[mdp]

Originally Posted by rcentros

If some folks want CLEARink color

It's not just colour: chiefly also framerate; reflectivity, low lag and decent refresh, colour, and improved power efficiency open or improve the possibility of use-anywhere displays to access information effectively (mobile OS, "desktop [more complete]" OS) anytime. Beyond sequential book reading (for that EPD is already happily fulfilling), the matter here is, for many of us, improving mobility on standard nowadays' "Memex-es" (say, your laptop), which are hardly (most probably not) optimal in visual quality and battery efficiency.

Just pointing it out because just mentioning colour seems to skew the solution a bit. Of course, any subset of the solution/s is then usable.

[FlyHero]

Originally Posted by mdp

What are you talking about? This is TIR, not E-Ink. TIR should be cheaper than E-Ink and reasonably close to LCD.

Sadly "economies of scale" is going to cancel out the fact this tech SHOULD be cheap. I'd happily replace all LCDs I own with reflective tech (might not be great for TVs but I don't have one). I hate backlighting. But it's going to be years likely before they even have a usable and available product (based on the delays so far) and that's apparently going to be a small tablet. Getting this tech to computer displays etc is going to be so far off some of us will be dead.

[leebase]

Keep the dream alive....pipe dream that it is. Three years from now we will be saying the SAME thing we said three years ago. Any day now...

[Hrafn]

Originally Posted by mdp

In those notes, Nate disregarded all of the non-technical progresses - and even the technical ones, so logically he disregarded everything - that make production closer.

I have no idea what you mean by "non-technical progresses[sic]", but if ClearInk is making all this wonderful progress, why haven't they started production yet, like they promised last year, and the year before?

A screen with faster refresh rate (for example) that is not in production is no more beneficial to the end consumer than a slower screen that is likewise not in production.

Has it occurred to you that the problem may be something that cannot be overcome by further tweeking of the prototypes, e.g. the economics of the manufacturing process (cost, yield rates, etc), or lack of sufficient interest from device manufacturers to go into full production?

And, with all due respect, I think and feel that you (happening to be the commenter) or many others taking CLEARink seriously or not will not dent reality much.

No more than will your perpetual cheer-leading dent it. My viewpoint does however have the advantage of not resembling that hoary old Peanuts cartoon featuring Charlie Brown (you), Lucy (ClearInk Inc) and a pulled-away football (production).

If the message is "don't hold your breath", well, in a world where "Don't dry the cat in the microwave" saves feline lives a number of people probably will be spared of asphyxiation.

If you dislike that metaphor, then the English language has a word for this circumstance: vaporware. Wikipedia defines it as "a product ... that is announced to the general public but is never actually manufactured nor officially cancelled." This would seem to describe the ClearInk limbo to a 'T'.

[mdp]

Originally Posted by Hrafn

I have no idea what you mean by "non-technical progresses[sic]", but if ClearInk is making all this wonderful progress, why haven't they started production yet, like they promised last year, and the year before?

Because Rome was not built in a day. Non technical progresses: Lenovo's funding, Tianma contracted etc. For the rest, your rhetorical question is illogical so I cannot answer it.

Originally Posted by Hrafn

A screen with faster refresh rate (for example) that is not in production is no more beneficial to the end consumer than a slower screen that is likewise not in production

How very incredible. Opposing what are you observing this?

Originally Posted by Hrafn

Has it occurred to you that the problem may be something that cannot be overcome by further tweeking of the prototypes, e.g. the economics of the manufacturing process (cost, yield rates, etc), or lack of sufficient interest from device manufacturers to go into full production?

Of frigging course, Hrafn. That is very clear. It's the "non-technical progresses" mentioned earlier.

Originally Posted by Hrafn

No more than will your perpetual cheer-leading dent it. My viewpoint does however have the advantage of not resembling that hoary old Peanuts cartoon featuring Charlie Brown (you), Lucy (ClearInk Inc) and a pulled-away football (production)

You are very wrong, Hrafn: I am not cheer-leading, I am showing interest in a technology, as should come without saying because otherwise what-the-frig would I be doing here. And, while I like your simile, I do not remember having ever kicked the ball - I am a different character in the background watching the game and publishing notes, in theory sharing with similarly interested people. In fact, overhearing instead people in the watching crowd lamenting that they wanted to go watch Coriolanus, what is that stupid game. Your viewpoint has the disadvantage of being idle and of zero contribution, which is anyway still more productive than viewpoints bringing negative contributions, such as "why should you read when you could play football" or "why should you read in mobility when you have an armchair at home" or even "football is played indoors".

I will express it again for clarity: the expression "They will never make it" is useless, as would be any opposite statement. That you «take ClearInk seriously» or not is "Ah, well, noted".

Originally Posted by Hrafn

If you dislike that metaphor, then the English language has a word for this circumstance: vaporware. Wikipedia defines it as "a product ... that is announced to the general public but is never actually manufactured nor officially cancelled." This would seem to describe the ClearInk limbo to a 'T'.

Thank you, I am acquainted with the term. And your contribution there would be?

[mdp]

Originally Posted by hap124

Sadly "economies of scale" is going to cancel out the fact this tech SHOULD be cheap

Probably. In theory, the part outside economics of scale should cover a fraction of the production. Which could still be relevant.
But it is an interesting note: the production of TIR based units is said to be only slightly more expensive than that of LCD, but we are used to the prices that follow extreme mass production for LCD...

Originally Posted by hap124

that's apparently going to be a small tablet. Getting this tech to computer displays etc is going to be so far off some of us will be dead.

Once you get the first things out, engineering modifications should be a breeze in comparison.

[underscore]

Originally Posted by mdp

I am a different character in the background watching the game and publishing notes, in theory sharing with similarly interested people.

I would like to add that most of the people outside is greatly unaware of the benefits of reflective screen.
The only people that really experienced reflective displays are book readers that tried e-ink on all possible light conditions.
My big android e-ink reader alwas impress people if i'm browsing a news website in a park.
Most would like to use a tablet in direct sunlight, just watch all idiots trying to see a whatsapp message will crossing the damn street.

If you don't know that something is possible, you don't ask for.

[mdp]

Further news came three days ago: the producers of front-light for CLEARink will be FLEx.

CLEARink’s patent protected, revolutionary display technology based on Electrophoretic Total Internal Reflection (eTIR) is low power, sunlight readable, color and video capable. FLEx’s front light technology offers an ultra-thin, low power solution for reflective displays. Together the companies are designing a display solution that takes advantage of the retro-reflective display and a high performance front light film that maximizes light output while reducing power drastically. The 9.7” display demonstrator for example, used only two LEDs.

FLEx’s frontlit technology is changing the way we look at our devices. Founded in 2004, FLEx’s technologies have created the world’s thinnest lighting system, which are currently powering next generation reflective displays and other lighting applications. These products provide critical lighting solutions for the rapidly expanding category of Reflective Displays to enhance and augment the rising tide of mobile, wearable, and flexible devices of the future. With 19 sales offices across North America and Asia, manufacturing capabilities in the US and Asia, and over 29 granted patents worldwide, FLEx can help device manufacturers extend battery life and deliver their products in the best light

[pdurrant]

Thanks. I'm looking forward to seeing an actual product sometime in 2020.

[Marinolino]

I'd probably also gladly use it as an auxiliary reading device, outside and inside the room, instead of the backlit lcd tablets and notebooks, for the color recognition, faster note taking, faster zooming, various dictionary apps/ebooks, encyclopedias etc. while simultaneously reading on the slower eink screens.