First touch screens, now touch paper(?)

From psychedelic posters to photocopied scrawl, flyers have been an essential part of promoting upcoming shows for bands since the 60’s. Recently at South by Southwest, group of British scientists and musicians introduced a new type of flyer. They call it a “listening post.” This new posters let you interact with printed pictures, so you can, for example, click on a band’s name and listen to a song clip or touch the name of the venue to buy tickets. The key to this process is conductive ink, which can be used in normal printers but can also store data. What?!? I know, it’s weird, and it won’t hit the streets for a couple years.

The BBC says this is one of several “paper apps” that the group has dreamed up. “Future versions could incorporate web connections so that packages, posters and magazines might be able to be updated.”