With all the fuss and bother over 4K televisions as the *new* new standard at last week’s CE Week,I was actually quite bored by this latest in the resolution revolution. Sure, all those massive TV’s LOOK phenomenal, but the current problem here is they all fall under the “bigger is best!” and “early adopters will indeed pay MORE for this new technology!” categories more than doing anything actually revolutionary.

That’s right folks, you’ll need a room the size of a small classroom and above and an entire wall or equivalent floor space for these door and door plus sized higher-def sets that come in at thousands to tens of thousands of dollars. If that’s not enough to keep the folks with small apartments and smaller wallets away in droves, there’s not a single 4K ready program out there to watch, meaning you’re buying into a TV that’s TOO good for what you’ll probably be watching. Yes, I’m sure that high-high def TV programming is on the way, but you all KNOW it’s going to be a reality show cavalcade and more sports (and if you’re spending that much on a TV and not season tickets… um… oh, nevermind)…

Don’t get me wrong – the image quality on every set I saw was phenomenal and I had to admit that had I the space and funds, I’d probably dive right in feet first just for gaming purposes and to check out my current blu-rays to see if I could notice whatever benefits upscaling had. Then again, I’m not that discriminating video guy other than demanding that black are blacks and not shades of greyish or blob-like darkness found in off-brand and some major HD sets. Other than assorted internet functions that basically turn your TV into a wall-sized facebook page or super-crowded screen full of apps, none of these new and expensive sets seemed to offer anything game changing other than bigger screens and nothing to do with them but engage in the usual passive viewer behavior. However, as soon as I walked around to the Westinghouse booth and saw their new 84″ LED 4K Interactive Whiteboard being displayed, my head nearly spun itself off in amazement.

(thank you,MyTVcollection!)

You can DRAW directly on the screen. If you’re thinking or saying out loud “And?”, guess what – you’ll catch on eventually (I think). As my brain was whirling around from all the artistic applications of such a device, one of the reps started in with his pitch about how the TV is “a high quality alternative to projectors in many government, educations and corporate settings” and I was really wishing he was thinking as far outside of the box as I was…

Now, they’re not the first manufacturer to have a whiteboard TV at all, but with a few tweaks, this technology has some pretty fun and awesome possibilities I’d go over in tons of detail here, but I’d be a nut to give away some of the stuff floating in my brain. I saw not only art potential, but gaming, sports and interactive entertainment creation that would allow users to do MORE than sit on their butts and take in what’s passed to them. Granted, the more creative and prolific users will need to integrate a PC and hard drive storage into the mix in order to create and share content, but those Whiteboard LED’s offer Windows 8 as part of the package.

Amusingly enough, the second thing I thought of was the old Winky Dink and You TV show from the 1950’s (rerun in the 1960’s and revived as a new show in the 90’s) that had kids “interacting” with a cartoon by drawing on a special film that attached to their TV’s. The company’s new LED sets combined with Windows 8 and some sort of internet TV broadcasting of a children’s show that encouraged creativity would be a wonderful bit of exclusive content, as would a few other creative programming ideas from art lessons to learning (and WRITING) foreign languages.

As for the gaming applications… well, I’m keeping that to myself for now, but I saw something no one else at that event saw that could be a huge and rake in a nice chunk of change if it’s applied to the company’s full lineup of whiteboard LED sets. The 84-inch model and its $16,000 price tag clearly puts it out of range of the home user and probably most schools, but the company has smaller LED Whiteboards (70”, 65” and 58”) that are less expensive (although still out of reach of most households) and if they decide to poke into a few interactive ideas (my brain is here to be picked), I can see smaller and more affordable TV’s using this technology becoming a standard and much more usable than a tablet or other device where you’re limited to entertainment purposes or “second screen” applications.

Eh, we’ll see where this goes. I doubt Westinghouse or any other manufacturer wants to dive into this and see what happens, but if they do… well,I’m fairly easy to reach (and I work reasonably cheap)…