Music is a great hobby, but it requires a lot of dedication, persistence, and practise. The learning curve can be quite steep depending on prior knowledge, and talent might not be tapped into until you reach a certain amount of practise. I used to play Trombone for my school band. What bothered me most about the instrument was the position of the notes: there were seven positions for which to move the slide towards, and simultaneously I was also supposed to tighten my embouchures (lip muscles) to produce different octave sounds. Because I had played piano prior, I didn’t find the notes to be too much trouble – but the process of translating the notes into positions and octaves was quite difficult to do, especially since I was supposed to do it instantaneously. I was one of the lucky ones – I caught on quickly, and I was able to excel at the Trombone. Unfortunately, some of my classmates couldn’t catch on fast enough – I’d have to play a note for them and they’d try to match it. This wasn’t too bad if it happened once in a while, but it did happen more often than not throughout the piece. That’s where I see potential in the Smartstand digital music stand. 
The Smartstand digital music stand is a portable stand that displays sheet music: at its core, this seems to be the major objective. This saves paper, and also saves from having the musician turn the page — which seems to be a nuisance for many musicians (myself included – I considered myself fortunate I wasn’t playing tuba and didn’t have to navigate clumsily to the stand with that gigantic instrument in my lap). Instead, there is a pedal where a musician can tap his/her foot on, and the page will turn. 
Although that’s dandy and everything, simply turning a page is just the beginning. I think the potential lies in music tuning, which seems to be one of the features it has (from what I see in one of those images above, it is an option). With this feature, when warming up, musicians can tune their instruments correctly; in the future, perhaps a feature could be implemented where it can preview the song as well, so amateur musicians can have an idea of how the song is supposed to sound before playing it for the first time. 
Love music? Check out the iRecord music gadget, electronic music synthesizer t-shirt and these cool Star Wars headphones. Check out Smartstand over at Alex Lancuba designs.
