Pop Around Town : New skin
文章日期:2015年3月24日

【明報專訊】Go to any major cities these days and you will see the so-called "new skin". It is used to decorate buildings, subways, bus stops, shopping centres, and many other public spaces. I am talking about digital LED billboards. They have been around for more than ten years as a functional media format, which is rapidly becoming major public media objects/spaces/surfaces, transforming the face of the urban environment as we know it. Bright, having high resolution, weather and dust resistant, and displaying multiple and looped (animated) messages in a shared surface, these digital screens are interesting because they not only direct our attention to information (e.g. in a railway depot, an airport, or even a lift), but are also there to sell products. The most famous set of electronic advertising billboards is, of course, the Spectacolor Board in New York's Times Square, which was mounted forty years ago. Today, Times Square New York is a busy intersection of art and commerce, where scores of bigger-than-life advertisements — electric, neon and illuminated signs and "zipper" news crawls — dazzle the public and vie for their attention. But these mounted or mobile screens have attracted some criticism. For example, new laws in California have banned the display of digital screens on highways, for fear of causing driver distraction and even road accidents. In Hong Kong, green groups have charged the bright screens for causing environmental pollution.

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