Pushing paper out the office
Found on BBC News on Friday, 29 February 2008
The idea of the paperless office has been around since the late 1970s but three decades on paper remains hugely popular.
One particular technology proving useful for this is Adobe's Portable Data Format.
About 15 years ago this started life as a simple way to preserve the look and feel of documents as they were passed between different operating systems and computers.
Another way to get rid of paper is to scan the documents and turn them into digital facsimiles. The relentless march of technology means today's scanners, even those found in the home, are more like the very expensive ones big corporations use.
It's fairly easy to reduce the need for paper drastically. I don't even have a printer installed anymore for at least 2 years now and never really missed it. But when there are still people around who print out every email just to read it and then throw it away, then the need for paper won't really change.