Surely it is inconvenient to have to have a light box in one's visual field for up to two hours several times a week. On the other hand, many of us spend too much time here, and for that matter too much time looking at a monitor generally, and we get depressed.
Clearly the best solution is to get out more, but in the meantime, a very bright monitor with a particular spectrum could be useful. It may be that the usual pixel colours don't cover the right part of the visual spectrum for this to work, but in that case, extra, violet, pixels could be used to ensure the light was daylight-like enough, with the possible added benefit of more realistic colour for video and photographs. Maybe there could even be pixels emitting the right frequency of ultraviolet light to provide a suntan and help synthesise vitamin D. If extra pixels weren't necessary then wallpaper, webpages and other documents could be designed to use a particular hex triplet closest to natural light.
In order to avoid insomnia, the light could change according to the time of day, so that as the sun set, the monitor could turn orange and eventually midnight blue, with text complementing these colours so as to be easily legible. Also, such a monitor setting could be used for jet lag.
-- nineteenthly, Nov 09 2005

F.lux http://www.stereopsis.com/flux/
Adjusts the monitor's colour temperature to match the time of day. [spidermother, Dec 08 2010]

Seasonal Affective Disorder

<she says weeping in the dark>

only kidding!
-- po, Nov 10 2005


You must be reading the wrong stuff here, teenth! Sometimes I come here when I am depressed but I have seldom left here that way. Quite the contrary. This is where I come when I need a giggle or guffaw, a friendly nudge in the ribs, or a good old-fashioned belly laugh. This is my happy place! The goodness I get from each visit more than eradicates any SADness this actual activity might bring about.
-- Canuck, Nov 10 2005


[Canuck], being here doesn't depress me most of the time, except for the occasional troll, but i do think working indoors in the winter probably isn't very good for one's mood, and i personally do use computers and the internet to escape depressing realities, just as someone else might get drunk. However, i agree that this is generally a happy place, though of course it's "not the happy cuddle club".

On the subject of skin cancer, i think the carcinogenic frequency is not the same as the vitamin D one. I'll find out.

I suppose the actual colour scheme could also help, as in dialogue boxes, title bars and so forth, and the sun going down with shadows on the 3-D effects getting longer would also be fun.
-- nineteenthly, Nov 10 2005


I suppose so, presumably it would be up to the moderators. I hope you get out of this soon, [jscottpete], but i could understand if you didn't given the decades of it i've had.
-- nineteenthly, Nov 10 2005


//in order to avoid insomnia//
So that's why I'm having trouble sleeping...

*walks over to [jscottpete] and gives him a big hug*
-- Susan, Nov 10 2005


I heard someone was talking about SAD and giving out hugs?
-- pathetic, Nov 10 2005


What would a group hug be then? Would it have curly brackets?
-- nineteenthly, Nov 11 2005


you get your curly brackets off me, now! do you hear?

jsp - lie in tomorrow, don't wake me till noon. zzzzzzzzzzzzz
-- po, Nov 11 2005


+ for the D3. Winter is almost here.
-- Shz, Nov 11 2005


//In order to avoid insomnia, the light could change according to the time of day// That part is now baked (link).
-- spidermother, Dec 08 2010


Excellent! Thanks, i'll try it now.
-- nineteenthly, Dec 08 2010


To have much effect, these lights need to be extremely bright. I don't think you could, or would want to, do this with a monitor. It would be like holding a book up to the sun and reading it. But [+] nonetheless.
-- MaxwellBuchanan, Dec 08 2010


Wonderful, another way for employers to "motivate" (pronounced "torment") their peons.
-- 8th of 7, Dec 08 2010


Yes, it would be very bright, or it could just make you sleepy at the end of the day by hinting.

I've been using full-spectrum bulbs for as long as i've been on the HB. I've even considered selling them to clients.
-- nineteenthly, Dec 08 2010


//I've been using full-spectrum bulbs for as long as i've been on the HB.//

Don't the X-rays make your keyboard brittle after a while?
-- MaxwellBuchanan, Dec 08 2010


This is one of those rare ideas that is so good, I think we will actually see it on the market in a few years. Probably advertised as "The new HP Dayview Ultra OLED!"
-- DIYMatt, Dec 08 2010


// I've been using full-spectrum bulbs //

We were wondering why we kept getting all that interference on Test Match Special on Radio 4 Long Wave.

Now we know.

And we're not happy.
-- 8th of 7, Dec 08 2010



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