Samsung may be developing a cover to protect your phone’s screen that doesn’t suck.
Right now, cases that protect your screen are like dumb wallets, covering the screen except for maybe a small window that lets you see time, date, and perhaps notifications.
But the Korean company may be considering a smart cover that changes all that. At least according to a new patent filed with the World Intellectual Property Organization unearthed by Dutch tech blog Lets Go Digital.
This protective device uses a touch-enabled electrophoretic screen like the ones in your e-reader. Its purpose will be to protect your phone’s screen from getting shattered while, at the same time, display information like incoming calls, notifications, or just decorate your phone while drawing very little power.
The patent also describes that the cover — which can be made of metal, wood, or plastic — will be smart enough to have a life on its own, with an independent low-power CPU, an NFC chip for contactless payment.
It’s clever, sure. But oh boy, there are a lot of questions to be asked here.
First, if this idea is good enough to patent, why not just make this a feature built into the phone itself, rather than an add-on? If it is integrated with the phone, it will surely shave some overall volume.
Also, why do we need covers in the first place? I hate them all, they are stupid: Most people buy a phone for its beautiful design, just to wrap it in something that completely breaks that design.
But I digress. Perhaps the biggest question is this: what’s going to protect this e-ink screen from breaking? Do we need a cover to cover the cover? And if so, will the cover that covers the cover have another display that requires another cover?
Eventually, this cover that covers the cover can create a rip in the timespace continuum and destroy reality as we know it. In other words Samsung: just work hard on making your phones shatter-proof and skip the stupid covers altogether.