I haven't even read 1984 but I know what a Telescreen is; a fictional-cum-real display that doesn't just show you images, but sees you, too. While this is clearly a useful device, not knowing whether you're being watched is a worrying possibility. And Apple Computer, self-appointed guardian of virtue, has not one or two but three patents designed to permit a display to watch the watcher.
The first patent involves concealing the camera behind a panel. These cameras could still be detected by disassembling the device and inspecting its contents, and as such will appear in any disassembly article. The second involves actually hiding the camera behind the display itself, requiring a specially-modified display panel and backlight. And finally, the real piece de resistance, and actually not the latest of these patents: A display whose image sensing elements are distributed throughout. With enough elements, focus and angle can be adjusted by simply sampling different elements. And even more worryingly, this sort of image sensor would be difficult for the user to detect, requiring very close inspection of the display, possibly with a microscope. Casual inspection of the display or even its contents would not reveal the presence of image sensor elements.
I understand that each of these inventions has utility, especially the two patents involving hiding the camera in or behind the display. Covering the camera when it is inside the bezel or case, by contrast, can "improve" the "style" of the device but simultaneously deprives users (or passersby!) of the knowledge that they are being recorded to no necessary end, unless that end is nefarious.
Am I proposing that we are currently being watched, unwittingly, by our seemingly-ordinary LCD monitors and laptop displays? Of course not. But the technology does exist to perform this type of surveillance without the user's knowledge or consent.
I did finally read 1984. Good times.