The Myth of the Paperless Office Revealed

[#1]

My colleague Jim Lyons posted this entry on his blog regarding the current
and future role of paper.

For the last 10-15 years there have been dire predictions on the future of
paper. And believe it our not, people are printing less in many areas as the
quality and number of documents online continue to increase. However at the same
time, the number of office and home pages printed continues to grow. How do I
know this? I am in the business and part of my job is predicting the number of
pages that will be printed in the future.

Why are printed pages growing you might ask? I won't bore you with all of the
techno jargon and bloody details of it all. I believe there are three main
factors:

• First, there are many documents that are now printed on home and office
  printers re-purposed from other printing sources. For example, those photos you
  use to print in your local drug store are just as likely to be printed on your
  home printer. Small businesses are printing marketing collateral like brochures, data sheets,
  flyers, etc. on their ink-jet or laser printer that were once only the
  domain of expensive commercial, off-set printers (and the desktop printer
  quality is terrific!).
• The second major factor is that the explosion of information - blogs, web
  pages, digital content, etc. has created a tremendous growth in the amount of
  pages available to be printed. So even if you print less of each type of
  traditional document - letters, spreadsheets, etc. you might find yourself
  printing more web pages, blogs, CD/DVD labels, and online articles.
• Finally, the quality of online viewing is not at the level of quality of
  printed documents. Ever try to read a book online? Was it an enjoyable
  experience? Well there are some alternatives. Amazon has introduced their Kindle "reading device". Other vendors and some of the big
  Fortune 100 labs (like Xerox Parc) have worked on this issue from time to time.
  The simple fact is that printed output is far easier to read than displays.
  Perhaps some day there will be alternatives that can put paper to the
  test.

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Tags: Paperless
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Printing,Marketing Material,Photo Printing,Amazon
Kindle

[#2]

In reference to last bullet point, my field research suggests that one reason users think the printed output (paper) is far easier to read is because that has been the de facto standard. Gradually a shift will occur as younger generations, which are being introduced to computers as early as the 1st grade, move into the workplace their de facto standard will be electronic.

I enjoy reading our blog!!

Max Rosenthal