Displays Everywhere: Dream or Nightmare?

At a certain point, saturation would be reached and there would be so many video displays around that they would all get ignored. Yeah, sounds a bit nightmarish to me.

If I were the owner of a building onto which someone else was projecting a display of electronic graffiti, I'd claim the right then to use my high-powered UV laser to beam a ****-off message into their projector, frying it. (Ooops, my bad!) If that didn't work, maybe using a rifle to beam a large quantum of solid lead would do the trick.

The only upside I can envision is walking down my street on a nice summer night and picking who's garage door is playing the best movie!

Remember when the promise of cable tv was that paying for it we would have no commercials? Here is a scary thought. We pay for not having advertisements everywhere but then we need advertising dollars to help pay for that.

How long before animated displays become so ubiquitous that one ignores them, much as one ignores the ubiquitous billboards?

There may also be some health issues involved. First of all, distracting drivers. Secondly, there are people sensitive to certain frequencies in artificial light (headaches and epileptic seizures from fluorescent lighting). I myself have trouble these days watching television- especially commercials and news broadcasts with rapidly changing image brightness- so far, only headaches, no seizures, but sufficiently disabling that I no longer watch television (except an occasional movie from a DVD).

I also get aggravated over the excess use of animated advertisements on the web, because they generally cause slow loading of the information I am really interested in- but that is another issue. How long before advertisers begin acknowledging that there may be negative response to needless animation?

Displays in the urinal of my favorite bar would be great around election time...

The questions center around the fundamental differences between electronics and paint-like coatings. We already have the ability to turn any surface into a display, it's just that most of them are static.

The same parameters will still control what gets painted electronically, what gets painted physically and what stays pristine. I could see a big city becoming visually much busier, but wilderness and open spaces will still be natural.

Most municipalities already signage ordinances in place to regulate this. They do not differentiate between a video sign or a printed/painted one.

In our old town you were allowed one 2' x 4' sign to advertise a business or cause. Anything larger and you are subject to fines.