Imagine a tiny picture frame that sticks to your fridge and shows your favourite photos, but it doesn’t need a battery at all. That is what a new kind of electronic Polaroid can do. It looks like a small Polaroid photo, but inside it has a special screen called an E Ink display.
E Ink screens are already used in e-readers, like some tablets for reading books. They are also used in price tags in shops, where the numbers can change without anyone printing new labels. These new fridge magnets use the same kind of screen, but instead of prices or words, they show colourful photos from your phone.
The clever part is how the picture gets onto the magnet. The magnet uses something called NFC, which stands for Near Field Communication. Many smartphones have an NFC chip inside them. When you hold your phone very close to the magnet, the phone sends both power and the photo through invisible radio waves. The magnet does not need its own battery because it borrows a tiny bit of energy from your phone just for a moment.
First, you choose a photo on your phone. Next, you hold your phone near the magnet so the NFC chips can connect. Then the phone sends the picture to the magnet’s E Ink screen. After the picture appears, the screen can keep showing it for a long time without using more power. This is one reason E Ink is useful: once the image is there, it hardly needs any energy to stay on the screen.
These magnets are sold by a company called VidaBay. People around the world can buy them online. Each one costs about $35.99. Some people might think that is a lot of money for a fridge magnet, but others may like that it can show different photos again and again without printing or batteries.
This new gadget shows how technology can make everyday objects, like fridge magnets, more interesting. It also helps people understand how NFC and E Ink work together. Instead of just reading about these ideas, you can see them in action every time you walk past your fridge and look at your changing digital Polaroid picture.