Jimmy, the mild-mannered student, has been busying himself lately with a constant flow of school assignments. He works incessantly in Ooo.org, breaking only for Bawls and bathroom, and becomes quite tired as a result.
As with any mild-mannered, half-asleep student, he begins to 'zone out' while he's
writing a geography essay (in French). Upon handing in this half assed homework, he is promptly handed a fail.
~~~
Do you find it easier to work with distraction ? Let me rephrase that. Do you enjoy listening to music while you work ? From my limited understanding of human psychology, we like to listen to music for one of two reasons :
One, is that it is relaxing.
Except with screamo.
Two, and here's the one I'm counting most people fall into, is that we are raised from birth to enjoy sound. Whether the pitter-patter of rain, or the enchanting melodies of AC/DC, we like to hear 'stuff'. Having something you enjoy combined with something you hate, can make almost anything (or one) bareable.
Here's where my idea comes in : a small window, around 52 * 39 (about one and one third of an inch wide) in the corner of the screen. Its main purpose is to distract weary eyes from the ever captivating wall-of-text, sound provided as background noise.
Mainly this would be for distraction. The quality would be low enough to allow swarmed streaming, files that small could be easily assembled with a large buffer. In addition, the experience of watching a miniature video on a monitor is nothing compared to watching the same on a television screen. I'd be surprised if anyone could be absorbed into a screen that size.
A selection of videos would be availible from prime-time television, ala ABC online, albeit with less adds due to the lessend user exposure.
And before it becomes a huge topic : I do NOT want to replace television, or distract the masses. This is meant to be like playing iTunes in the background while working : harmless.