14 DAY TRIAL // The USPTO this week published a patent application signed Apple Inc. which describes a device that blends key features from the iPhone with those that would be found on Apple’s rumored iWatch. Flexible displays are mentioned all the way.
This revolutionary iPhone would presumably be all-display, using a curved / flexible glass that makes it possible to see and access content anywhere on the device – front, back, and sides.
As the image provided by Patently Apple shows, the Cupertino company wants to achieve a portable computing device that uses up all of its physical surfaces for displaying information, as well as controls when the user hovers with their finger over it.
“…by holding a finger over the volume indicator an action could be triggered expanding the volume control over the entire left side of the device.”
A second flexible display is described in one embodiment where 3D imaging is proposed.
“…visual content can be presented by the first flexible display out of a temporal phase with the visual content presented by second flexible display. In this way, an illusion of depth perception can be presented mimicking a 3D experience.”
The patent also explains that, thanks to the wraparound design of the display, photos and video can be presented in a continuous loop. Now that sounds futuristic!
Scott Myers is credited as the only inventor of the device. Apple originally filed for the invention in 2011.
The patent in question is particularly noteworthy amidst rumors of a potential iWatch being released soon.
Many of the concepts described in this invention fall in line with the technical details tossed around by various analysts in the media who are predicting that Apple will launch a wearable computing device in the near future.
It is also worth noting that such intricate, futuristic inventions rarely come to fruition.