Yesterday, Engadget reported that LG is putting 19-inch flexible e-paper displays into production. They also ran a photo of what they believe to be the paper in action from last January:

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And may I say: Holy shit. The idea of a bendable newspaper that changes as the news changes is an incredible idea that feels at once incredibly new and very old-school futuristic. But this e-paper is just a display—you'd need hardware to actually send the information wirelessly to the paper, and that hardware probably wouldn't be as flexible as the display itself—and Engadget assumes that this technology will mostly be used for signage and other display purposes. I have no doubt that one day (probably soon, at the rate we're going) these displays would be ready for newspapers to use.

But I don't have any confidence (especially since, as Eli pointed out in the Morning News, even USA Today is surrendering a great deal of ground from the daily paper newspaper game) that the newspaper will still be a compelling object by the time this technology catches up to the display. More likely, some future version of the Kindle will be a sheet you can roll up and stuff into your pocket. But by then the newspaper broadsheet will be mostly done with as a meaningful cultural symbol.