Screensavers

Most computers still have screensavers.

Although it turns out the name ‘screensaver‘ has become a bit of a misnomer. It’s been about a quarter-century since computers needed a moving image to “save” a CRT monitor from getting a “burned-in” image. LCD and LED monitors don’t have this problem.

So why do we still use screensavers?

We ended up liking them. Watching screensavers became a cool habit. Once computers could display moving images after a configurable period of inactivity, why would we bother to get rid of this feature?

And why am I even interested in this topic?

Yesterday, I noticed that the screensaver on our large Roku TV behaved differently than expected. I thought the slow horizontal motion of the image was a constant. I assumed that an object leaving the left-hand side of the screen would eventually reappear on the right-hand side of the screen.

But this isn’t what happened!

I was delighted to discover that my long-standing assumption was wrong.

The motion of the objects in this screensaver was more like the motion of windshield wipers. The whole scene moved to the right, briefly stopped, and then moved to the left!

Granted, windshield wipers move in an arc, whereas the objects in the screensaver scene only moved horizontally, but you get what I’m saying.

The motion of everyday objects, whether real or virtual, does not always match our expectations. This is fascinating!

Pay attention to the behavior of the stuff around you. Who knows? If you let your curiosity guide you, you may make a more significant discovery than mine!