I think the intent was not only to not do harm, but to undo the burn-in caused when the screen is on by cycling each pixel on and off. (Early CRT monitors used to have a “memory” of what was on there before, similar to the artifacts left behind after e-ink screens are cleared)
Plus early on you couldn't turn off the screen from the PC, only the physical button worked. We had to wait for VESA blanking IIRC to have something working.
So either your screen was always on, or you printed moving pattern to avoid burning the phosphor.
If you worked with color (like graphics designer for example) you wanted to avoid turning off your monitor because you needed at least 30 minutes of warm up to stabilize brightness and color fidelity of a CRT. Showing anything beside blank screen indicated to you that the computer is turned on. Animation has been obvious to avoid burn in.
In the era of beige crt monitors and not caring about electricity consumption it was all the rage to personalise your screensaver. A lot of people used them to display personal pics of their animals, family, cars etc. in place of putting physical pics on the desk. In a corporate environment with uniforms people did what they could to add some flare :-)
Prior to the mid-1990's, blanking the screen simply meant painting the screen black in software. Later video cards would allow you to turn off the video signal and monitors would blank if they lost the signal. However, this would only work if both ends supported power saving modes. Otherwise the electronics (including the picture tube) for the monitor would operate normally. The only other option was to turn off the monitor manually or, on machines with an integrated monitor, to turn the brightness down.
If the monitor is going to be on anyway, why wouldn't people want to display something interesting on it?
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Why did screensavers ever do anything besides just blanking the screen?
I think the intent was not only to not do harm, but to undo the burn-in caused when the screen is on by cycling each pixel on and off. (Early CRT monitors used to have a “memory” of what was on there before, similar to the artifacts left behind after e-ink screens are cleared)
Plus early on you couldn't turn off the screen from the PC, only the physical button worked. We had to wait for VESA blanking IIRC to have something working.
So either your screen was always on, or you printed moving pattern to avoid burning the phosphor.
If you worked with color (like graphics designer for example) you wanted to avoid turning off your monitor because you needed at least 30 minutes of warm up to stabilize brightness and color fidelity of a CRT. Showing anything beside blank screen indicated to you that the computer is turned on. Animation has been obvious to avoid burn in.
In the era of beige crt monitors and not caring about electricity consumption it was all the rage to personalise your screensaver. A lot of people used them to display personal pics of their animals, family, cars etc. in place of putting physical pics on the desk. In a corporate environment with uniforms people did what they could to add some flare :-)
Yep. The Matrix screensaver took over my office by storm in 1999.
Prior to the mid-1990's, blanking the screen simply meant painting the screen black in software. Later video cards would allow you to turn off the video signal and monitors would blank if they lost the signal. However, this would only work if both ends supported power saving modes. Otherwise the electronics (including the picture tube) for the monitor would operate normally. The only other option was to turn off the monitor manually or, on machines with an integrated monitor, to turn the brightness down.
If the monitor is going to be on anyway, why wouldn't people want to display something interesting on it?
a) Entertainment
b) Fun