3D... What are the implications?
There’s been a few mentions of 3D in the last couple of bulletins and you will, no doubt, have seen all the adverts for 3D-enabled TVs. There’s a lot riding on its success, with cinema and computer games investing heavily in it.
Youtube recently launched an innovative 3D service which transforms 3D videos into several different formats because there isn’t one established format yet (there’s the red and green glasses, the black glasses, amber glasses etc).
And projectors are increasingly 3D-ready, meaning 3D presentations in class are a reality (I saw a demo of a 3D heart which was pretty engrossing). You can see a corporate video advertising its use here.
However, the jury’s out on its pedagogical worth and now, it seems, the jury’s out on the health implications. Nintendo have issued a statement warning against under 7s playing the new 3D Nintendo 3DS and Samsung have issued health warnings about prolonged use of their 3D products.
What to do? Well, the technology’s very new and early adopters are going to pay the cost of all that R&D. And the health concerns are only just coming to light and being discussed. So maybe we should just wait and see for now!
