Printing Less
If you've read this more than a few times, or have known me for more than a few minutes, you'll probably know that I try to be environmentally concsious. I pick up after group lunches, separating trash from recycling if possible. I'll re-use plastic cups and try re-washing plastic utensils at work; and so on and so forth.
But one of the things I've been resistant to is reading all news and things on the computer screen. I would say I get the majority of my news and periodicals online. But for many of those, I opt to print them and read the hard copies instead of enjoy on the computer screen.
Several years ago, Julia told me that her office was going paperless. Here are my main skepticisms of an effort like that, which is tied to my tendency to print instead of read online:
- how do you keep files with you when you want or all the time?
- how do you take notes?
- how do you refer quickly to things like directories, which are constantly available, say on a bulletin board next to the computer?
- how do you connect with people off-line (not just people who are currently logged off, but people who don't have access to computers or the internet at all)?
- how do you keep from damaging your eyes with constant reading from the computer screen?
I intend to interview Julia about where her office is right now in their paperless effort (please comment about it). But short of that interview, I'll answer those few questions as a new advocate of paperless as best I can.
- Keep files with you all the time with: laptop/notebook computers, personal digital assistants (see stolen image above), high-tech meeting spaces, etc
- Take notes: Low-tech ways like cut-paste word processing and mixing up fonts within the same document, higher tech ways like Track Changes within documents, short-hand word processing, and more
- Refer quickly to directories/bulletin board stuff: wisely sort files and folders
- Connect with people off-line: don't know
- Avoid damaging eyes: get a glare decreaser
Just a couple hours ago, I printed what I hope is my last article from online to off-line; the article is about dead-lifting. From now on, I will work on going paperless for news and more. Or at least I'll try reading my news on the computer screen, if not totally paperless.
Note: I do not have a pda and am not endorsing them. The picture is included to give an idea or how to go paperless.
2 comments:
Hi Ben! I am with you. I like to read articles and books in tangible paper. But, I try to be eco-friendly by printing double-sided. I always print my class notes out 2 per page... I haven't reached the age yet where I have trouble reading small print (thankfully!)
Sometimes when I am traveling, I do not want to be carrying copious amounts of reading material, so I save it as pdf files which are text searchable.
If you haven't tried Google Desktop, I would recommend it for finding files, words, phrases, documents, phone numbers, etc. that are on your computer/flash drive that you can't remember where you originally saved.
Hi Ben!
So... this is definitely interesting because awhile back a few friends and i were thinking of ideas to help with this exact problem. As a researcher, I have stacks of journal articles on my desk. Most people prefer to read these in print for the reasons you've already mentioned. But... what if you could download a paper to your pda/phone which would have both an audio component (article is read to you) as well as a better interface for pics/plots/images, AND allow you to take notes that were saved to the file "in the margins" ... hmm. There's a program called Papers for mac that allows you to search for, save, and organize articles as pdfs (and I think you can make notes) - kinda like itunes for journals. but still isn't exceptionally friendly for eliminating the desire just to read on paper.
anyway, if you want to work w/ me on this idea, have ben send you my email addy...
angela.
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