Could this be the saviour of print media?

Bridgestone (yes the tyre company), recently wowed the crowds with a 3mm thick E-paper at a recent Tokyo trade fair. It resembles a flexible piece of paper with touch screen technology. So, it seems updateable newspapers and magazines have suddenly become within reach.

According to ePaperCentral, “unlike other e-paper devices like the Kindle and Sony’s 505/700, the Bridgestone model does not use E Ink based technologies. Instead, it uses a powerful technology built in house that could completely revolutionize e-paper called QR-LPD.” With HP and Fujitsu already pushing e-Paper, Bridgestone is the latest Kindle-killer to the market.

The A4 sized full-colour capabilities are amazing. The ability to scribble-on-screen is ensuring Bridgestone’s 13” colour screen ‘has the future written all over it’. What’s more the paper does not need a continual power supply, as when it’s switched off it maintains the image on screen through its ‘memory state’. Great news for the environment. However, two problems which are not insurmountable remain – screen refresh is rather slow (0.8 secs min) and the price is prohibitive ($500+).

Yet, I can still hear Rupert Murdoch salivating already and perhaps we can really now save some trees.