Bernie Goldbach in Kilkenny | Image from Uranium
YOU HAVE TO BE WILLING to slice up jeans to mount a scrolling LED screen and then connect it with a web server on a mobile phone in order to enter the niche spankvertising market, but without the birching, the whips or the bare cheeks.
Do it with the right technology and you could beam your text messages to walking and scrolling messages on the street. A few years ago, before the advent of Adwalker, I was looking into a project that brought the skillsets of multimedia programmers together with fashion statements. More than five years ago, Charlie White reported on Uranium Jeans, the walking attire that can spell. "The scrolling LED text, displayed by an embedded flexible micro screen, can be changed via text messaging from a cellphone, or stock messages can be downloaded from the Uranium Jeans web site." You needed around €300 for a pair of these text-ready jeans back then. They never became a mass market item. For the fashionistas in the audience, Uranium Jeans come ready for men, women and accompanied by accessories. With bendable screens and Mifi dongles now reaching affordable price points, I reckon it's just a matter of time before some clever marketeer figures out how to put walking hashtags into pedestrian areas.
Charlie White -- "Make those Uranium Jeans talk" via Textually. The jeans in the photo cost just under €280 in St Tropez.