In December of 2019, I wrote about this LED backpack and how it looks to me like mobile digital signage. The idea for that blog came to me after I’d seen someone wearing a similar rig on their shoulders a few months previous at InfoComm 2019.
The idea struck me as a great promotion for digital signage: if your customers want custom content, give them a taste of your programming skills by showing up with one of these on your back.
Corny as that idea was, I realized that there may be a very different reason for wearable LEDs now; namely, in the form of facemasks.
While it seems hard to believe, we may very well be on the way to getting back to in-person events later this year. The only issue with that is we don’t exactly know if we’ll still need to wear masks as an extra precaution.
If we do, I can only imagine integrator attendees will want to spruce up their facial coverings. Why not demonstrate their signage capabilities on their face?
The idea of a mask that isn’t just a piece of cloth has already taken off. Japanese startup Donut Robotics developed an internet-connected “smart mask” that transmits and translates messages from Japanese into eight other languages. Lady Gaga wore an LED facemask during her entire performance at the 2020 VMAs.
While we all eagerly await a world where we can see each others’ faces again, there is some merit to the idea of wearing a mask in very crowded spaces or when you’re already feeling under the weather. It’s a cautious, considerate gesture, one that other parts of the world started embracing long before the first case of the 2019 coronavirus.
But if the mask wearing trend is bound to continue, why not put some pizazz (in the form of LEDs) into it?
