Web Reactions

When we think of the pace of technology and the way things are changing, one of the areas in which this is demonstrable is in the area of paper. From the earliest days of written language to today, we have not only come a long way with the materials we use to record that language, but we the pace and scale of that change has accelerated dramatically.

Some of the earliest scribes used clay tablets to record official documents. These tablets, although decidedly bulky, actually had several advantages. First, all you needed was clay and a stylus or even a simple stick. There was no need for fancy tools or the chemical formulation of inks. Second, once hardened and set, official documents recorded on clay tablets were fairly permanent. Although they could be broken or erased by rewetting the clay, they were just about impossible to alter. This property made them perfect for commercial contracts, legal agreements, and even treaties, since both parties could be assured of the security of the document’s contents.

The bulkiness of clay tablets, however, gave way to primitive papers or paper-like materials. Papyrus, thin sheets of animal hide, tightly woven linen and many more different writing materials held sway for literally thousands of years without substantial change. These papers all required a writing implement to leave some ink or other contrasting residue to form words. Various dyes, formulated inks, and even metals such as lead were used at various times throughout history. Although today’s pencil leads are made of other materials, actual small lead rods were once used as writing implements. The metal was so soft that drawing it across paper would cause enough lead to rub off that it left legible marks upon the papers.

These early papers were relatively difficult to make, had varying qualities and consistencies, and varying life expectancies. The introduction of cellulose or wood pulp paper and the industrial paper mill changed the availability and cost of paper. Combined with mechanical printing presses, this innovation made books a low cost commodity available to almost anyone.

The reliability of mechanical printers made them ideal to record commercial transaction at the point of sale. Cash registers would not only calculate the total sale amount automatically, but print out an itemized list of the purchase for both customer and merchant. These small point of sale (POS) printers were made even more efficient by the introduction of thermal paper. Thermal paper required no separate ink to be kept in the printer mechanism. Instead the ink was trapped in a matrix within the thermal paper rolls and was released selectively by the application of heat to form printed characters. This increased the reliability of the POS printers by reducing moving parts.

Nowadays, we see not just the small leaps of the past, but major transformations such as magnetic stripes on debit cards that can be read and rewritten electronically. There are electronic books like Amazon’s Kindle, and even flexible e-paper that allows entire books or newspapers to be displayed and then erased for the next day’s edition to be downloaded.

One can only imagine the next paper revolution, but if the pace of change continues its current trend , it won’t take long to find out.