Last week, I began writing a post about how BusinessWeek's 1975 prediction of a "paperless office" by 1990 was a dream denied—but ended up, instead, discoursing briefly on the history of printing. Note: I have a reputation that—when asked what time it is—I will generally tell that person how to build a watch. So be it.
The indisputable fact is, though, that the goal of replacing paper with pixels is most likely unattainable, as is argued by Abigail J. Sellen and Richard H.R. Harper in their study: The Myth of the Paperless Office (The MIT Press, 2001). In that study, the authors assert that e-mail use increases paper consumption by 40%, and that even Web use has increased our printing—especially among so-called "knowledge workers," which I would imagine, includes students, teachers, lawyers, executive secretaries, writers, and on and on. In fact, knowledge workers use as much as three times as much paper as the average worker. That's a 300% increase, folks.
The authors suggest of reasons: first, what Sellen & Harper refer to as "affordances: the activities that an object allows or 'affords'," such as the ability of paper to be grasped, carried, folded, writing, etc. Paper as a medium is also "friendlier" for the purposes of collaboration and marking up by authors and others. Any writer, journalist, or documentarian is familiar with the utility of a yellow highlighter or a blue pencil.
So, what does that have to do with laser toner and compatible cartridges, which is, after all, the overarching subject of this blog? This is the point:
- Whether or not we're consciously aware of the reason(s), we'll be printing out more and more information and documents as time goes by;
- because of the "razor and blades" pricing model the printer manufacturers employ, printing costs will continue to rise—due, primarily, to the high cost OEM products;
So, what's the answer?
- If you are in a writing-intensive area (student, teacher, lawyer, writer, etc.) hie-thee-hence to the local office supply superstore (I happen to prefer Costco, but there's also Sam's Club, or Walmart) and pick up a low-to-medium priced laser printer. If you're wondering why I suggest a laser printer, please refer to the laser vs. inkjet printer comparison in an earlier post; then,
- go to suppliesexperts.com to stock up on compatible laser toner cartridges for your particular model. Ours can run up to 60% less than the manufacturer's brand-name products.
So, that's about it for today. If anybody out there would like to suggest a topic for a future blog entry, send it along to roger@suppliesexperts.com. I'd love to blog someday about Neil Postman and his ideas on print vs. other media. Or, about Bob Greene's terrific series of columns in the 80s called "Reading is a Vacation."
Before ending this blog, I'd like to leave you all with a . . .
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