Well if you have been on another planet for the last 5 years you might have failed to notice that the world seems to have undergone a widescreen revolution.  I couldn’t tell you who is responsible for the move but some unknown force has been surreptitiously replacing our standard 4:3 ratio screens with 16:9 items.  I’m not sure it’s even possible to purchase a 4:3 TV anymore and camcorders, laptops and monitors are all following type.  Thinking aloud though, I can’t help thinking John Logie Baird made some monumental cock-up in the original design of the TV set which has since taken 80 years to resolve. 

My theory is compounded by the revelation that some of his other inventions were not altogether successful. In his twenties he tried to create diamonds by heating graphite and shorted out Glasgow’s electricity supply. Later Baird perfected a glass razor which was rust-resistant, but shattered. Inspired by pneumatic tyres he attempted to make pneumatic shoes, but his prototype contained semi-inflated balloons which burst. He also invented a thermal undersock (the Baird undersock), which was moderately successful. Baird suffered from cold feet, and after a number of trials, he found that an extra layer of cotton inside the sock provided warmth.  I may just have been able to give him the heads up on that one.

I’m sure he would have appreciated my current 42″ widescreen plasma, (in the required 16:9 format of course) which not only would have left him dumbstruck, but with a power rating of 300w would have nicely kept his feet warm if he had cared to sit within a few feet of the screen.

 But what we have clearly forgotten is that the watchmakers of the 1970’s beat the electronics giants to it.  ‘Widescreen’ watches were more popular than the Morecambe and Wise christmas special.  

This beauty, a 1970’s Nivada Antares is typical, now for sale on our site.  Aesthetics aside, the time, of course is no easier to read, but in pure engineering terms the large case design makes better use of the lateral space available on your wrist.  Oscar Wilde quoted that “Fashion is a form of ugliness so intolerable that it has to be altered every 6 months”, and throughout the 80’s and 90’s you wouldn’t have been able to wear one for fear of the fashion police being called.  Thirty or so years later, these mega styled timepieces are all the rage again with Vintage Omega Dynamics (more oval than 16:9 granted) fetching the price of a new 42″ plasma.    

I wonder what John Logie Baird would have made of it all.