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Big screens are so 2012: Samsung is planning a phone with a three-sided display

Samsung is reportedly working on a Galaxy-branded phone with a display that curves around the edges for next year.

Samsung basically invented the super-sized phone with its Galaxy S series of elite handsets. But now that the five-inchish display has become old hat, the Korean manufacturer has begun to experiment with wholly new display form factors.

Fresh off a limited release Galaxy Round (which for the record is curved, not round), Bloomberg is reporting that Samsung is planning to release a Galaxy-branded three-sided phone next year.

According to the unnamed sources, the three-sided display would wrap around the edges of the phone, so that messages could be read from an angle. The new multi-angle display would likely be first available in the Galaxy S or Note series.

The new form factor utilizes a flexible OLED screen technology known as YOUM, the same used in the Galaxy Round. YOUM has also been demonstrated to be bendable and flexible--though its Round debut was in a static (if curved) form factor.

Samsung perhaps provided a preview of its wrap-around display phone at this year's CES. As you see in this video of the introduction of a YOUM-fitted prototype, notification information can be displayed on the side via the curved display:

In a way, this three-sided display is a natural evolution of existing technologies--a logical successor to the LED indicator.

However, the real excitement is probably beyond phones, where this capability can lead to all new crazy devices that bend, roll-up, and just get all-around science fiction-y.