Motorola projector phones: gimmick or genius?

Is there any category of consumer electronics device that's safe from the mobile phone's rampant ambitions? We've already heard excitable predictions that mobiles will kill off digital cameras, MP3 players and portable satnav gadgets. Now Motorola has announced plans to put tiny laser-based projectors into its handsets.

"By projecting content displayed on the device screen onto a wall, object or even a curved surface, mobile users could easily share Websites or multimedia applications such as movies, personal videos, mobile TV, photographs and presentations with friends or business colleagues," says the announcement.

The deal, signed with 'pico projector' firm Microvision, is undeniably innovative. But does anyone actually want a projector inside the next RAZR?

The first thing to say is that this isn't just sci-fi futuregazing on Motorola's part. Microvision's PicoP technology exists, and works (you can read about it here). The company also operates in areas such as head-up displays, wearable screens and military displays, although mobile projection is its most consumer-friendly application.

But the big question is why you'd want it in your phone, other than as a gimmick to make your mate's GPS-toting N95 look like a relic from the dark ages. Not that I'm discounting that as a powerful incentive for millions of people to upgrade - after all, how many people bought the original RAZR just to show off its laser-etched keypad? New features - especially new features that other manufacturers haven't launched yet - do sell phones.

Some applications make more sense than others. Being able to project a PowerPoint presentation from your phone onto a whiteboard or wall will have many business folk chucking their briefcases in the air with joy at the thought of not having to lug a portable projector with them to sales meetings. Won't it?

I'm not so sure. Partly because portable projectors are ever more portable nowadays, and partly because by definition, these people will rely on their phones for communication - voice calls and push-email in particular.

Motorola says it chose Microvision because its technology is less power-guzzling than rivals, but surely projecting a 30-minute presentation will use up a significant chunk of battery life, and if they're not organised, users could find themselves out of juice at the worst possible moment (i.e. when calling their boss to say their swanky presentation clinched / lost the deal).

Maybe Motorola is looking further ahead, to a time when fuel-cell batteries will be standard in phones, allowing regular top-ups. Or maybe they think the people using their phone to project in a business stylee will just make sure they get a car-charger installed, or use a separate phone for their communications.

What about the consumery applications of mobile projection then? Projecting websites onto the wall from your phone certainly solves the problem of browsing full-size websites on a small mobile screen, but it does rely on being in a comfortable position in front of the right surface.

Watching videos? I can see teenagers merrily projecting their latest happy-slapping videos onto their classroom whiteboard when their teacher isn't looking, and on a less flippant note, projection could be marvellous for impromptu slideshows of your camphone snaps, rather than making people crowd round you to see the phone screen.

Mobile TV? There are many reasons why people don't like watching mobile TV, but none of them are related to being unable to project it onto a wall. Gaming? Actually, as someone who does pester friends to look at the latest mobile game I've downloaded, the ability to play them large is quite cool.

But it all comes back to battery life really. For me, none of these potential applications are appealing enough to make me want to risk running out of juice later on. The success of this technology depends on exactly how power-efficient Microvision's technology is, and of course on the quality of batteries supplied in whatever Motorola handsets get it first.

The geek in me says mobile projection could be genius, but the hard-headed consumer in me thinks it's more likely to be a gimmick. Let's see where this deal leads before making a final decision.