Idea of the Day: Holographic ebooks (R2D2 knew this was coming)

Do you remember that classic scene from the first Star Wars movie (yeah, I know it was actually episode IV) where Luke discovers R2D2’s holographic image of Princess Leia imploring “Help us Obi-Wan Kenobi, you’re our only hope?” I bet that’s not too far off.

No, not the Star Wars part…that was a long time ago (in a galaxy far, far away). I’m talking about the hologram. If you go to YouTube and search for “holograph television” you will find some really cool examples of sophisticated technology that already exists. Today’s idea-of-the-day isn’t here yet, but probably will be sooner than later.

Introducing holographic ebooks.

Here’s a cool video illustrating my point. The video might be a fake (or maybe it’s real…I really don’t know), but that doesn’t matter; the technology is on its way.

What really interests me is how this is going to affect the whole screen-size debate: Do you want to read ebooks on your Kindle or iPhone? I’ll take “Option C” thank you, as ‘reading’ on either of those platforms will eventually become a misnomer. Some smart company is going to figure out how to build an iPhone hologram that will be perfect for reading, especially if you can adjust the size of the display.

What about the privacy issues? You don’t want everyone to see what you are viewing, right? Maybe the inventors will also come up with “black-lighting” (my new term for projecting a hologram onto a black screen) so you’ll only be able to see the images if you are looking at them head on, similar to a computer’s privacy screen.

As cool as this would be, what would really blow my mind would be the ability to write notes on the virtual pages, highlight selections and save my edits.

How can you imagine holographic technology being used in the future?