
Go Paperless in 2013 - mazsa
http://www.paperless2013.org
======
sheraz
Not joining.

I like paper, and I don't care if some think it is wasteful.

I like reading without a screen.

I like the feel in my hands.

It does not require batteries or electricity.

I can doodle and jot in the margins.

It spreads out on my work table as a kind of personal caching system.

It degrades gracefully, unlike a most digital file formats.

I would encourage anyone interested to find a copy of "The Myth of the
Paperless office" by Abagail Sellen and Richard Harper [1] (No affiliate link
below)

[1] - [http://www.amazon.com/Myth-Paperless-Office-Abigail-
Sellen/d...](http://www.amazon.com/Myth-Paperless-Office-Abigail-
Sellen/dp/026269283X)

~~~
Cowen
I don't think going paperless is for everyone, and I even agree that paper
just _feels_ better.

That said, I'm personally transitioning to mostly paperless for purely
pragmatic reasons. I can't keep my papers organized, and I no longer want to
be bothered to constantly store and move them. It doesn't help that I save a
bunch of papers "just in case" that I end up never needing again.

I think I would be better off with a scanner and digital backups for
everything. If I really need the information in paper format, I can just print
it on-demand and not have drawers, folders, or bins lying around. Getting rid
of all my old papers even has the added benefit of making every paper I do
have that much more recent and important, which will (hopefully) lead to it
being dealt with more promptly and efficiently rather than getting lost in
some pile on my desk.

That said, I'm certainly not joining this. I'll reconsider when my plan
eventually blows up in my face.

------
sync
Is this just a thinly veiled advertisement for HelloFax?

Whois information for paperless2013.org:

    
    
      Admin Name:Neal OMara
      Admin Organization:HelloFax
      Admin City:San Francisco
      Admin State/Province:CA
      Admin Postal Code:94109
      Admin Country:US
      Admin Email:founders@hellofax.com

~~~
joelandren
We're making no secret that we're driving this.

[http://pandodaily.com/2013/01/01/with-peer-pressure-and-
acti...](http://pandodaily.com/2013/01/01/with-peer-pressure-and-actionable-
advice-hellofax-aims-to-kill-paper-in-2013-for-good-this-time/)

We're also proud that while this was originally our idea, we've found great
partners who agree this is a worthwhile cause: Google, Fujitsu, Manilla,
Expensify and Xero

------
ErrantX
Why? To save trees/paper? Or to save the planet?

Where is the evidence to help me decide whether this pledge is worthwhile?

Is paper production a major polluter, and does it impact deforestation (I
remember reading somewhere a while back that a lot of paper comes from managed
woodland)?

If I replace my paper with these services (assuming a lot of others do too) am
I contributing a meaningful carbon footprint?

I'm not saying this is a bad pledge, or one I won't take. But it seems to
assume very readily that we agree using the internet instead of paper is a
GOOD THING, without backing it up...

~~~
guiseppecalzone
Joseph here, cofounder of HelloSign.

The average office worker uses 10,000 sheets of paper a year. Multiply that by
the working population and that's an enormous footprint. The unfortunate part
is that using that much paper is completely unnecessary, as there are services
that make paper use obsolete.

The problem with people going paperless isn't the technology, but the
awareness that the technology exists. That's why we teamed up with Gogole
Drive, Fujitsu, Expensify and others - to help people stop using paper for
good.

~~~
vasco
You failed to provide the proof he asked for though. What he means is,
assuming a majority of the paper production comes from managed woodland,
making the destruction of habitats and so on a mute argument, how does that
compare to having datacenters being built everywhere, and what is better?

~~~
icebraining
The premise that paper requires less servers is odd, in my opinion. Documents
come from servers anyway, the main difference is whether they go to your
printer or your screen.

------
andrewflnr
I don't think it's a good idea to go paperless unless you can avoid dependence
on services over which you have no control. These things have to be self-
hostable.

------
yesimahuman
"e-signatures" are still a touchy subject in business. What can we do to help
make them more acceptable and widespread? Is there any precedent that they are
equal to a paper signature?

~~~
guiseppecalzone
Joseph here, cofounder of HelloSign. e-Signatures are legally binding. It's
more of a cultural attachment that keeps us using "wet signatures". Check out
our legal page for more details: <http://www.hellosign.com/info/legal>

In terms of making it more widespread, it takes some work.

The way we're doing it is by combining e-signatures with other services and
doing user education and cross pollination between the services. Our other
product is HelloFax, which lets you send and receive faxes online.

But, I think we're getting closer to an inflection point as society is
starting to use e-signatures more and more.

~~~
niggler
"Additionally, we encrypt all of your statically-stored user files and
signature information in Amazon’s S3 servers"

Why wouldn't you host those yourself? Aren't there concerns and operational
risks involved when using Amazon?

~~~
imperialWicket
It's difficult to weigh costs once you're at a static scale, but while
bandwidth and storage is growing, cloud services tend to offer substantial
savings. In this case, the cost benefits for S3 compared to owning your own
servers are tremendous.

There are always concerns and risks involved with hosting personal data, but
it's not fundamentally different based on cloud hosting compared to colocation
(or even managing hardware at your own location). There's mild complexity
because 3rd parties are involved, but this is quickly becoming the norm.

------
drue
For the first time I've recently been seriously considering going paperless at
home.

However, every great solution involves uploading my scans to online services.

This is something I'm not comfortable doing with my sensitive data (i.e. tax
records).

Has anyone found or developed tools that can be run locally to organize my
files? Something like evernote? I'd like to just scan and shred, and not have
to fuss too much with naming files, manually organizing files, etc. A good pdf
search interface is a must.

~~~
ChuckMcM
Kind of makes me wish that we had a sort of local server appliance that was
zero administration but provided a safe place for all of our documents at
"home".

------
dysoco
I whish I could go paperless. I'm in high school, and let's admit it: my
notebooks are a complete mess, and it's kind of annoying.

We get free netbooks in school, that we carry every day, and I though "Great,
this year I'll take notes with the notebook and store them in the cloud".

But... nope, teachers don't allow you to do that, mainly because they think
you are in Facebook (Duh, we don't even have internet!).

Seriously, my life would be much easier.

------
aleprok
I will not go paperless at least not for now, because I do not see how paper
production is more polluting compared to server farms which use ton of
electricity which has to be generated somehow and we still generate ton of
electricity from some other color sources than green. Paper then again is
easily recycled and more we recycle it the less we waste wood.

Then there is the business side of this. If average office worker prints
10,000 sheets of paper per year the paper would cost about 100 euros per year.
The black laser casettes would cost about 400 euros per year. This comes down
to 500 euros per year and this supports workers working in the ink and paper
industry. If I really need that much paper I can always pay the price of it.
When going completely paperless would put the cash on the hands of few
founders and server administrators and would require those who I am in contact
with to use the same or compatible services.

~~~
icebraining
Server farms are still used to get the document to the printer.

------
jdlegg
In the grand scheme of things, going paperless is not really a significant
tactic to mitigate climate change or other environmental impacts. The paper
industry has one of the best environmental track records and paper is one of
the only truly sustainable products in existence.

In contrast, computers, data centers, mobile phones, and communication
networks are well on their way to becoming one of the biggest sources of
carbon emissions on the planet. Heavy metals, lead, and other hazardous
materials are also frequently present in electronic products.

Paper itself is one of the most recycled products. Its production often lends
itself to easy use of renewable energy sources (like hydro power) and proper
forest management provides a sustainable source of raw materials as well as a
carbon-sink [1].

[1] [http://www.paperbecause.com/paper-is-sustainable/paper-
truth...](http://www.paperbecause.com/paper-is-sustainable/paper-truth-or-
fiction)

------
dctoedt
Special-case counterpoint: Insisting on getting _paper_ bills from your cell
phone service provider can make it easier to detect unauthorized third-party
"cramming" charges. Being able to review the details of your bill when you
open your mail can be useful if, like me, you're the sort who doesn't always
keep up with the on-line version. I just switched back to paper billing for
that reason; see <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4994127>.

------
mazsa
[http://googledrive.blogspot.com/2013/01/go-paperless-
in-2013...](http://googledrive.blogspot.com/2013/01/go-paperless-in-2013.html)

~~~
af3
"Posted by Meredith Blackwell, Product __Marketing__ Manager"...

~~~
neilc
... and your point is? This is exactly the sort of activity I'd expect a
marketing manager to be involved with. "Marketing" isn't a dirty word.

------
brunoqc
I hope it's more than just ads from their partners.

------
bruceboughton
I can't recommend Doxie portable scanners enough. The centrepiece of my
paperless workflow.

~~~
adanto6840
Thanks for this - I've been contemplating something similar for a while.

Out of curiosity:

A) Which model do you recommend / use?

B) How does it perform for scanning ~40 page documents in? I've been thinking
about looking at a auto-feed scanner but curious about how this might perform
instead...

~~~
bruceboughton
I have the original Doxie
(<http://www.getdoxie.com/product/doxie/index.html>). I haven't tried their
newer models.

I use it mainly for 1-5 page documents and it works great except if the
document is printed on _really_ poor paper or the lead edge is crumpled. You
do occasionally have to re-scan a page if it doesn't feed properly or gets
rotated halfway through feeding.

If you are scanning 40 page documents and can afford the extra space you might
want to consider a scanner with an auto-feed as your rescan rate may be higher
than mine! The software is relatively easy to use and allows you to re-order
pages, etc.

------
npsimons
Sure, sure, I'd love to go paperless too; just a few little details:

1) No, I will not store it on your server.

2) No, I will not run Windows or OSX to run your software.

3) I'd really like the source code.

Get back to me when you've solved those problems.

------
craig552uk
Not for me.

I like paper. I like pens. I like to get away from my computer and phone. I
like to scribble, sketch, doodle, draw and take time to discover thoughts.

Paper will always be in my toolbox.

------
sown
Don't forget your passwords.

In all seriousness, though, I wonder about how people store their personal
documents. What is everyone's favorite search utility for their desktop?

