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Paper is an incredibly versatile tool: 1. You can cut, tear, fold, roll, crumple, burn, sew, staple, glue, laminate, etc. it, including sticking found objects

Paper is an incredibly versatile tool: 1. You can cut, tear, fold, roll, crumple, burn, sew, staple, glue, laminate, etc. it, including sticking found objects to it, wrapping things with it, making it into 3-dimensional structures, ... 2. It comes in a wide variety of colors, textures, thicknesses, and sizes – if you want you can cover your whole wall with one piece of paper. Some paper is translucent and can be used for tracing. 3. You can draw/write/paint over it with a wide variety of substances with a wide variety of appearances. You can fit visible information more densely on paper than pretty much any other available medium. 4. There are many nice tools for interacting with paper, such as rulers, compasses, french curves, pantographs, planimeters, ... You never run into a case where two drawing tools can’t be used together because they run different operating systems. 5. You can easily make physical copies of electronic documents and images onto paper, easily manipulate paper documents, easily copy paper documents from one piece of paper to another, and easily put paper documents back into digital form. 6. It’s incredibly cheap. 7. The right kinds of paper stored properly last a really really long time (centuries if not millennia). 8. It is light and portable, can be stuck up pretty much anywhere. 9. It requires no batteries, no legacy systems, no software updates, no expensive equipment, no special training, .... 10. It is its own concrete physical record, which can be effectively checked for tampering and made difficult to forge at scale. (Hence use for money, ballots, contracts, titles, ...)

mysterypie 9y ago
> rulers, compasses, french curves, pantographs, planimeters I had never heard of a planimeter[1], but what a fascinating device it is! I'm surprised that such a thing is possible: that you can calculate the area of an arbitrarily complex shape just by tracing the perimeter with a simple mechanical device. Unfortunately, how it works is not at all intuitive but seems to require a fair amount of math to understand. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planimeter https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planimeter
- jacobolus 9y ago
  If you have ever studied vector calculus, the idea is a straightforward application of Green's theorem. The discrete version is the 'shoelace formula'. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green%27s_theorem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green%27s_theorem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoelace_formula https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoelace_formula This kind of thing is one of the more important ideas from 19th century math/physics, and is studied by most STEM undergraduates in their first or second year.
- progval 9y ago
  I know a researcher (Olivier Bournez) who uses the planimeter as an introduction to analog computing. His claim is that planimeters are single-purpose analog computers, much like calculators are single-purpose digital computers. He then logically generalizes planimeters into General purpose analog computers, which I find quite fascinating. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_purpose_analog_computer https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_purpose_analog_compute...
- jaclaz 9y ago
  >I had never heard of a planimeter[1], but what a fascinating device it is! Not only, it was (is) extremely accurate if used properly. I am old enough (unfortunately) to have used planimeters professionally in the '80's (just before drawing started becoming digital), at the time they were largely used because they were much faster than calculating exactly (and already hand calculators with trigonometric functions existed) some data in roads cross-sections. So, for temporary accounting, planimeter based measures of areas were accepted (usually reduced by 5% or 10%). Basically you had a (hand drawn) inked drawing of each cross section of the road (usually one every 20 m or so) where you would draw a pencil line at the level that was reached in the works, and then use the planimeter to get the area (and consequently volume) of the earthworks done at the date. When the level was final, the amount would be calculated analitically, still manually, usually, but I managed somehow to write for the HP97[1][2] (constrained by 256 steps!) a small program capable of automatically calculating that, of course typing the measures manually. Large stretches of the road earthworks had already been calculated by the planimeter and when re-calculated, the differences were very small, within 1% or 2%. [1] http://www.hpmuseum.org/hp6797.htm http://www.hpmuseum.org/hp6797.htm [2] http://www.hpmuseum.org/97.jpg http://www.hpmuseum.org/97.jpg
jansho 9y ago
Agreed. I’ve tried many, many alternatives and paper and pen are still the most convenient and intuitive form for taking notes, sketching, constructing etc. I have a system where these notes get digitalised at some point of time though.
jaclaz 9y ago
I would add: 11. Your whole organization won't likely ever be brought on its knees by a virus or ransomware attached to a piece of paper or fax. 12. Even if your device batteries are low, or you are in a blackout, the piece of paper can still be read [1] [1] This is specific to plane tickets/boarding passes, I have been mocked for printing them by the same people that had it on their smartphone (and I already saw it happen twice that the battery/device died at the time of boarding/passing checks)
- y4mi 9y ago
  11: if your company doesnt have cold storage backups at that point, its just begging to get their day ruined. 12. this doesn't get solved with paper copies because the workers still won't know what needs to be done because at least half of the documents will be digital. They will at most be able to organize their paper copies, which is something which wouldn't be necessary if they'd gone digital-only. your plane ticket/boarding pass mention is also flawed. You will eventually get into trouble if you have a single point of failure. It doesn't matter if its a paper or a phone on which the data is stored. A paper can get damaged or lost just as well as a phone's battery can die at an inopportune time. Thankfully, you're not limited to a single copy nowadays. Its easy to a. print the ticket for security and b. use the app for check-in
  - jaclaz 9y ago
    I never said that the company/organization can't stand up again (after restore, i.e. after several hours of frantic works by the IT guys), only that it can be brought on its knees. And as well, the same people who lose the paper ticket (or have it stolen) may well have lost their smartphone (or I would say with some more probabilities, have it stolen). But I appreciate the single point of failure note.
- tonyedgecombe 9y ago
  I wonder if the flu virus could get carried on a piece of paper.
y4mi 9y ago
And you will most likely be able to do all of that and more with apps like google tilt brush. I'm guessing you don't know what it actually is, so i'll leave a link here https://www.tiltbrush.com/ https://www.tiltbrush.com/ Its amazing what humans were/are able to do with paper though. It just won't be as relevant as technology advances.

mysterypie 9y ago

> rulers, compasses, french curves, pantographs, planimeters I had never heard of a planimeter[1], but what a fascinating device it is! I'm surprised that such a thing is possible: that you can calculate the area of an arbitrarily complex shape just by tracing the perimeter with a simple mechanical device. Unfortunately, how it works is not at all intuitive but seems to require a fair amount of math to understand. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planimeter https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planimeter

jacobolus 9y ago
If you have ever studied vector calculus, the idea is a straightforward application of Green's theorem. The discrete version is the 'shoelace formula'. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green%27s_theorem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green%27s_theorem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoelace_formula https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoelace_formula This kind of thing is one of the more important ideas from 19th century math/physics, and is studied by most STEM undergraduates in their first or second year.
progval 9y ago
I know a researcher (Olivier Bournez) who uses the planimeter as an introduction to analog computing. His claim is that planimeters are single-purpose analog computers, much like calculators are single-purpose digital computers. He then logically generalizes planimeters into General purpose analog computers, which I find quite fascinating. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_purpose_analog_computer https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_purpose_analog_compute...
jaclaz 9y ago
>I had never heard of a planimeter[1], but what a fascinating device it is! Not only, it was (is) extremely accurate if used properly. I am old enough (unfortunately) to have used planimeters professionally in the '80's (just before drawing started becoming digital), at the time they were largely used because they were much faster than calculating exactly (and already hand calculators with trigonometric functions existed) some data in roads cross-sections. So, for temporary accounting, planimeter based measures of areas were accepted (usually reduced by 5% or 10%). Basically you had a (hand drawn) inked drawing of each cross section of the road (usually one every 20 m or so) where you would draw a pencil line at the level that was reached in the works, and then use the planimeter to get the area (and consequently volume) of the earthworks done at the date. When the level was final, the amount would be calculated analitically, still manually, usually, but I managed somehow to write for the HP97[1][2] (constrained by 256 steps!) a small program capable of automatically calculating that, of course typing the measures manually. Large stretches of the road earthworks had already been calculated by the planimeter and when re-calculated, the differences were very small, within 1% or 2%. [1] http://www.hpmuseum.org/hp6797.htm http://www.hpmuseum.org/hp6797.htm [2] http://www.hpmuseum.org/97.jpg http://www.hpmuseum.org/97.jpg

jansho 9y ago

Agreed. I’ve tried many, many alternatives and paper and pen are still the most convenient and intuitive form for taking notes, sketching, constructing etc. I have a system where these notes get digitalised at some point of time though.

jaclaz 9y ago

I would add: 11. Your whole organization won't likely ever be brought on its knees by a virus or ransomware attached to a piece of paper or fax. 12. Even if your device batteries are low, or you are in a blackout, the piece of paper can still be read [1] [1] This is specific to plane tickets/boarding passes, I have been mocked for printing them by the same people that had it on their smartphone (and I already saw it happen twice that the battery/device died at the time of boarding/passing checks)

y4mi 9y ago
11: if your company doesnt have cold storage backups at that point, its just begging to get their day ruined. 12. this doesn't get solved with paper copies because the workers still won't know what needs to be done because at least half of the documents will be digital. They will at most be able to organize their paper copies, which is something which wouldn't be necessary if they'd gone digital-only. your plane ticket/boarding pass mention is also flawed. You will eventually get into trouble if you have a single point of failure. It doesn't matter if its a paper or a phone on which the data is stored. A paper can get damaged or lost just as well as a phone's battery can die at an inopportune time. Thankfully, you're not limited to a single copy nowadays. Its easy to a. print the ticket for security and b. use the app for check-in
- jaclaz 9y ago
  I never said that the company/organization can't stand up again (after restore, i.e. after several hours of frantic works by the IT guys), only that it can be brought on its knees. And as well, the same people who lose the paper ticket (or have it stolen) may well have lost their smartphone (or I would say with some more probabilities, have it stolen). But I appreciate the single point of failure note.
tonyedgecombe 9y ago
I wonder if the flu virus could get carried on a piece of paper.

y4mi 9y ago

And you will most likely be able to do all of that and more with apps like google tilt brush. I'm guessing you don't know what it actually is, so i'll leave a link here https://www.tiltbrush.com/ https://www.tiltbrush.com/ Its amazing what humans were/are able to do with paper though. It just won't be as relevant as technology advances.