Plastic Chips: New Semiconducting Polymers Fabricated

I love the idea of having multiple sources for creation of semiconductors. I'm more then a little nervous about where it will lead in regard to misuse. This technology will make it quite easy for the Madison Avenue marketing firms and government agencies to slip tracking devices into packaging.

Someone who wants to get in on the ground floor and strike it rich should develop some sort of detection/blocking/disabling device (ala Star Trek tricorders) for these things.

The organic materials have been made in an academic environment; scaleup for industry, particularly with a multi-step synthesis involved, will likely delay any commercial release for more than "a couple of years". I also am skeptical about how "low-cost" these materials will be; the researchers are using perfluoroarenes, which are presumably not cheap. There may also be EPA regulatory issues--compounds with more than 4 or 5 sequential fluorinated carbons tend to bioaccumulate.
I do not doubt that organic semiconductors will eventually be quite common. But I don't think we need to worry about their misuse just yet--the professor cited in the article is just being a good salesman. (Something I noticed in grad school--for the purpose of obtaining grants, etc., the same project can be presented with many different shadings and proposed benefits. Typically all of these "advertised" features are possible, but only a few are likely to be practical.)