Seattle newspaper to publish on e-paper

US newspaper publisher Hearst has announced that it will trial versions of the Seattle Post Intelligencer on electronic paper within the next two years. 

The 120 year-old company, which dates back to William Randolph Hearst's proprietorship of the San Francisco Examiner in 1887, will pioneer flexible colour LCD displays from LG Philips to deliver real-time daily news. 

Articles carried on the electronic newspaper will be today's, rather than yesterday's, claim Hearst officials.

They hope to run the trials in other cities where Hearst publishes daily newspapers. The company owns 18 newspapers, 29 TV stations, 18 magazines and numerous websites in the US.

The electronic display will be a colour tabloid size (A3) screen the thickness of card, so that readers will be able to roll up the screen and carry it.

Turning the page, i.e. refreshing the screen with a new page image, will involve touching a pressure-sensitive control at the page edge.

While the screens will be made by LG Philips, they use technology developed by E Ink, a company in which Hearst invested when it was spun out of MIT a decade ago.