:/. This is definitely an important and I think unappreciated issue right now, and I'm normally all for long form investigations too. But I don't think this piece structured it very well. It started losing me right at the beginning with what felt like an outdated description of technology applied too broadly, and then not actually bothering to cover the very real improvements changing things until the very end, and even then putting off concrete coverage of who deserves kudos until later. It goes
>They’re internally blue LEDs with a phosphor coating that shifts some of the energy from blue over to the rest of the spectrum - the reds, yellows, and greens.
>They look white to the eye, but they’re actually three separate peaks of light, and they don’t do a very good job rendering colors.
But this seems unnecessarily hand-wavey. We have actual specific measures for this in the form of CRI (color rendering index, 0-100 with natural outdoor light being 100) and R9 (a measure of strong red rendering, which most people tend to like, incandescents tend to be in the 90s). It's definitely true that lots of common cheap LED bulbs have poor CRI and R9, and even these aren't necessarily linked either. But it's also perfectly possible to get decent bulbs that do both ok or focus well on things like helping sleep. The plain old Ikea Tradfri E27 White (like $12) has a CRI of 90 and an R9 of 91. There is a specific sleep focused "bedtimebulb" that has a CRI all the way up at 95 and a respectable R9 in the mid-80s. The Ketra line of lighting gets specific about this as well. This isn't some impossible problem.
Which the article does kind of acknowledge, but only at the very end. If more people knew to look for and ask for these measures, then the market could better respond accordingly. It could be worked into various lighting standards as well for work and government. But "LED lights and screens are killing you" from the beginning doesn't strike me as a good approach.
Basically, the lede should have been the "future reviews" bit and the author should have waited on doing them first because otherwise it's just defeatist. Give people something that is actually actionable, not a "well you're screwed and that's that" because nobody is giving up their screens. Structure should be "these things matter and are in fact being done with more to come, but most don't know to look for these measures and they are far too hard to find, this is something that action should be taken on." Then get into the nitty gritty of why. The goal should be something people can take with them, like at a schoolboard meeting parents being able to ask about the CRI/R9 and general quality of their children's lighting.