With the growth of outdoor digital signage along roadsides in many cities, concerns have grown about the potential dangers posed by LED, LCD, and plasma screens when used as digital billboards.

From New York’s Time Square to London’s Piccadilly Circus, digital signage is now popping up everywhere, and if US influence goes its normal way, digital billboards will soon appear on roads and highways all over the world. the world.

Already in the US, however, these new digital billboards are causing controversy with some activists suggesting these outdoor digital billboards are a dangerous distraction for drivers and some hardline safety advocates suggesting that they should be banned.

The problem with the debate about the possible distraction that digital advertising can cause to drivers is that to date no research has been done on the effects of LED billboards, LCD screens and other digital advertising on motorists.

Yet to critics, digital billboards are considered as much of a distraction as mobile phones, and, activists say, unlike mobile phones, digital roadside advertising cannot be turned off.

However, the outdoor digital signage industry argues that roadside digital billboards are no more dangerous than standard roadside advertising and that examples of accidents caused by digital signage are only anecdotal.

And for every example of a traffic collision caused by a driver distracted by digital advertising on the road, outdoor digital signage can cite a similar incident with static billboards (an infamous static bra ad is alleged to have caused dozens of accidents in the United Kingdom).

The digital signage industry also argues that, to date, despite little legislation outlining what content can be displayed, the industry by convention does not use moving images in digital roadside advertising.

And its self-regulatory moves like this one, which can bypass restrictive legislation governing digital roadside advertising and billboards, though it will only take one serious incident or irresponsible implementation to bring the entire industry under the restrictive rules governing the use of outdoor digital signage.