Legal Research

If You Think Gasoline Is Expensive, Then Consider This

On average, your printer’s black ink costs you about $4,731 per gallon.

This tidbit comes from PC World, which recently ran a test using one of the models from each of the top 4 printer manufacturers to see just how much ink is left in a cartridge when the printer forces you to change it.  The results:

• Canon - their cartridge shut down with 24% of the ink remaining; a third-party cartridge left 45% behind

• Epson - theirs: 8%, third-party: 41%

• HP - both their cartridge and that of a third-party manufacturer printed until empty

• Kodak - theirs: 43%, third-party: 36%

A shameful waste of energy, chemicals and packaging, not to mention money.

The facile conclusion?  Third-party print cartridges may cost less to buy, but given their inferior performance they may not be cheaper to use in the long run.

The more important conclusion?  Stop printing.  Look for creative ways to capture, store and communicate important info.  For example, I have a Mac at home, so I can print to a PDF file, which I can email to others.  (With a little work, you can do this with Windows, too.)  How about sharing documents with colleagues using Google Docs or Zoho?  And at Jenkins, we’ve recently added a feature to our online catalog so that you can text the title and call number of a book to your cellphone.

I recognize that you can never eliminate all of your printing.  But this is simple stuff.  It’s all about changing bad habits.

Full post as published by Jenkins Webblits on November 10, 2008 (boomark / email).