Personally, I think this story from the New York Times is ridiculous.
You can read it for yourself shortly, but in it, it criticizes Japan for still using fax machines, while the U.S. and other fully developed countries have long since passed it by.
Read the story HERE.
But, if I may, let me come to the rescue of Japan - as if it needs rescuing...
My company in Canada has fax machines - about 20 of them. Why? Quite simply not every one of my company's customers is as high tech as the rest of the world.
Personally, I have a computer - and darn near everything I need for work or my blog can be done with my computer. The main exception for my blogs are when I need to utilize a scanner to scan in an image.
At work, I interview companies all the time - it boggles my mind how often these same companies do not have a website. Successful companies, too. It's just not at the top of their list of things to utilize.
But a fax? Surely people could send information quickly via e-mail? Surely it isn't because people believe that the Internet is not a safe place to send information while then sending information via fax that anyone could easily intercept?! No....
So why use what many think is such an outmoded means of communication? Probably because people like to have documents that utilize a signature. A binding signature.
Yes, you can sign a document and then scan it and then have that scanned document attached to an e-mail and instantaneously (almost) be sent to someone else who then has to print that document and save it in a paper file... but with a fax, you just sign a document, send it via fax and the recipient already has a paper copy in hand for filing purposes.
It's a measure of convenience.
What about the need for a paperless society? It will never happen. Companies lack the financial resources to convert everything to digital.
Yes, they can send and receive as many electronic documents as they want in the 21st century, but many companies have been around for decades. What about the records from the 1980s... or those from the 1920s?
Yes, it can all be digitized... scanned in and kept off site in a Cloud-based security storage system, but aside from the cost and time required for such an undertaking - money that few companies have to spend - I think many companies simply do not trust the security of computers.
How many times have you had a computer crash? How many times has your computer simply gotten old and given up the ghost? I'm on my fifth computer since 1993 since I left Japan and arrived back in Canada.
In that time, I have had a virus take out everything in one computer causing me undue headaches while I tried to save my photographs scanned into the machine... headaches while I tried to save my stories - lost! And this is me taking it to IT geeks with knowledge so heavy it would make your head spin.
As well, what about the every changing landscape of technology?
I have many stories saved on the 5-1/4-inch floppy diskettes of the 1990s... how do I access the information contained on them now in 2013?.
I also have untold numbers of 3-1/2 inch diskettes (not so floppy). I have so many stories on there it's not even funny. I have a collection of comedy stories (Dust Bunnies Of The Mind) and dramatic stories (Brain Methalyl), copies of It's A Wonderful Rife (written 20 years plus ago) - stuff I was unable to access because all of a sudden home computer manufacturers stopped making computers with ports for diskettes, as CD-Rom became the norm.
Luckily my friend Rob had copies of everything (I think) that I wrote and sent him while in Japan.... but I had to purchase an external 3-1/2 inch diskette reader and move them into the computer I am using now.
It took a while to access that information. Time and money. But at least those stories are saved. I think. There were several diskettes which simply could not be read... age, perhaps.
I still can't get at the stories in the 5-1/4-inch floppy diskettes. Not really trying, but you know what I mean.
CD-Rom? I have a boss whose computer reads CD-Rom, but no one uses those anymore... it's DVD discs... so he can't even read the data, as our workplace lacks the funds to update everyone's computers... though I have a top of the line MAC at work and PC at home. At least they were top of the line a few minutes ago.
And now it's USB thumb drives... My computer has two ports for those - so does my Japanese built television!
But what's the next form of technology that will render my current computer storage system obsolete?
yes, I can pay some off-site company to store my data - but why should I have to pay an extra fee? Security? Sure - but it's still extra money.
The fax machine... yes, it's terribly old school... but it works.
Oh... and for you older kids out there... do you remember when you would get a mimeograph copy of a handout from the teacher? Ahhhh... smell that stink! That was a free high that every student enjoyed.
It's funny that the New York Times is laughing at Japan and its love affair with outdated technology. It's a newspaper. How's all that inexpensive advertising working out for it? Certainly a lot cheaper than the rates it used to have for its actual newsprint newspaper.
Pretty soon, because all of the news is available on-line free (sometimes for a cost) newspapers will be a thing of the past, as already kids laugh at those of us who use paper rather than the more modern technological marvels of the computer and Internet.
Yes... you can get all your news on-line... but not from newspapers as more and more will find it no longer financially viable. Then you can get all of your news from Twitter - as written in 140 characters or less by Becky, a Grade 9 student who thinks you are old. And I like Twitter... as a tool. Not as a news media, however.
Twitter? I have 1200 people I follow... and some tweet crap every few minutes. True crap. And so... I get several thousand tweets a day... how do I separate the interesting stuff from the crap? How do I spend my short amount of time looking for things I want or need when I am bombarded by crap? I can't. Epic fail. I haven't seen a huge bump in my readership because of Twitter or Facebook? I have seen more spam come through my computer via e-mail, however. Thanks for that, by the way.
Picking on Japan because it has discovered that a large chunk of its business-base uses the fax? So what? At least they are willing to cater to this business base.
Oh... and just because Japan is supposedly high-tech in its inventions, it doesn't mean that the average Japanese person is hip with it.
When I left Japan, people still were using monochrome computers in 1993. I had a color one in Toronto. I also immediately signed up for the Internet... something I hadn't even heard of while I was in Japan.
People in Japan aren't as rich or as willing to embrace new technologies as readily as one might think, regardless of all the Japanese companies out there that manufacture them.
I'm not calling the Japanese old... but the population is getting up there in age. And just because you are so up with your technology, not everyone else is.
I've never owned a cell phone, tablet or even a pager. I've never owned an MP3 or 4 player either. I suppose that makes me a dinosaur. But... I do know how to forensically take apart a computer thrown away in the garbage and recover every single file on it that you think you have deleted.
Maybe I'm not so old, after all.
By the way... along with this blog, this story is also available on Twitter and Facebook. Not that anyone will notice, of course.
Somewhere, just the fax, ma'am.
Andrew Joseph
You can read it for yourself shortly, but in it, it criticizes Japan for still using fax machines, while the U.S. and other fully developed countries have long since passed it by.
Read the story HERE.
But, if I may, let me come to the rescue of Japan - as if it needs rescuing...
My company in Canada has fax machines - about 20 of them. Why? Quite simply not every one of my company's customers is as high tech as the rest of the world.
Personally, I have a computer - and darn near everything I need for work or my blog can be done with my computer. The main exception for my blogs are when I need to utilize a scanner to scan in an image.
At work, I interview companies all the time - it boggles my mind how often these same companies do not have a website. Successful companies, too. It's just not at the top of their list of things to utilize.
But a fax? Surely people could send information quickly via e-mail? Surely it isn't because people believe that the Internet is not a safe place to send information while then sending information via fax that anyone could easily intercept?! No....
So why use what many think is such an outmoded means of communication? Probably because people like to have documents that utilize a signature. A binding signature.
Yes, you can sign a document and then scan it and then have that scanned document attached to an e-mail and instantaneously (almost) be sent to someone else who then has to print that document and save it in a paper file... but with a fax, you just sign a document, send it via fax and the recipient already has a paper copy in hand for filing purposes.
It's a measure of convenience.
What about the need for a paperless society? It will never happen. Companies lack the financial resources to convert everything to digital.
Yes, they can send and receive as many electronic documents as they want in the 21st century, but many companies have been around for decades. What about the records from the 1980s... or those from the 1920s?
Yes, it can all be digitized... scanned in and kept off site in a Cloud-based security storage system, but aside from the cost and time required for such an undertaking - money that few companies have to spend - I think many companies simply do not trust the security of computers.
How many times have you had a computer crash? How many times has your computer simply gotten old and given up the ghost? I'm on my fifth computer since 1993 since I left Japan and arrived back in Canada.
In that time, I have had a virus take out everything in one computer causing me undue headaches while I tried to save my photographs scanned into the machine... headaches while I tried to save my stories - lost! And this is me taking it to IT geeks with knowledge so heavy it would make your head spin.
As well, what about the every changing landscape of technology?
I have many stories saved on the 5-1/4-inch floppy diskettes of the 1990s... how do I access the information contained on them now in 2013?.
I also have untold numbers of 3-1/2 inch diskettes (not so floppy). I have so many stories on there it's not even funny. I have a collection of comedy stories (Dust Bunnies Of The Mind) and dramatic stories (Brain Methalyl), copies of It's A Wonderful Rife (written 20 years plus ago) - stuff I was unable to access because all of a sudden home computer manufacturers stopped making computers with ports for diskettes, as CD-Rom became the norm.
Luckily my friend Rob had copies of everything (I think) that I wrote and sent him while in Japan.... but I had to purchase an external 3-1/2 inch diskette reader and move them into the computer I am using now.
It took a while to access that information. Time and money. But at least those stories are saved. I think. There were several diskettes which simply could not be read... age, perhaps.
I still can't get at the stories in the 5-1/4-inch floppy diskettes. Not really trying, but you know what I mean.
CD-Rom? I have a boss whose computer reads CD-Rom, but no one uses those anymore... it's DVD discs... so he can't even read the data, as our workplace lacks the funds to update everyone's computers... though I have a top of the line MAC at work and PC at home. At least they were top of the line a few minutes ago.
And now it's USB thumb drives... My computer has two ports for those - so does my Japanese built television!
But what's the next form of technology that will render my current computer storage system obsolete?
yes, I can pay some off-site company to store my data - but why should I have to pay an extra fee? Security? Sure - but it's still extra money.
The fax machine... yes, it's terribly old school... but it works.
Oh... and for you older kids out there... do you remember when you would get a mimeograph copy of a handout from the teacher? Ahhhh... smell that stink! That was a free high that every student enjoyed.
It's funny that the New York Times is laughing at Japan and its love affair with outdated technology. It's a newspaper. How's all that inexpensive advertising working out for it? Certainly a lot cheaper than the rates it used to have for its actual newsprint newspaper.
Pretty soon, because all of the news is available on-line free (sometimes for a cost) newspapers will be a thing of the past, as already kids laugh at those of us who use paper rather than the more modern technological marvels of the computer and Internet.
Yes... you can get all your news on-line... but not from newspapers as more and more will find it no longer financially viable. Then you can get all of your news from Twitter - as written in 140 characters or less by Becky, a Grade 9 student who thinks you are old. And I like Twitter... as a tool. Not as a news media, however.
Twitter? I have 1200 people I follow... and some tweet crap every few minutes. True crap. And so... I get several thousand tweets a day... how do I separate the interesting stuff from the crap? How do I spend my short amount of time looking for things I want or need when I am bombarded by crap? I can't. Epic fail. I haven't seen a huge bump in my readership because of Twitter or Facebook? I have seen more spam come through my computer via e-mail, however. Thanks for that, by the way.
Picking on Japan because it has discovered that a large chunk of its business-base uses the fax? So what? At least they are willing to cater to this business base.
Oh... and just because Japan is supposedly high-tech in its inventions, it doesn't mean that the average Japanese person is hip with it.
When I left Japan, people still were using monochrome computers in 1993. I had a color one in Toronto. I also immediately signed up for the Internet... something I hadn't even heard of while I was in Japan.
People in Japan aren't as rich or as willing to embrace new technologies as readily as one might think, regardless of all the Japanese companies out there that manufacture them.
I'm not calling the Japanese old... but the population is getting up there in age. And just because you are so up with your technology, not everyone else is.
I've never owned a cell phone, tablet or even a pager. I've never owned an MP3 or 4 player either. I suppose that makes me a dinosaur. But... I do know how to forensically take apart a computer thrown away in the garbage and recover every single file on it that you think you have deleted.
Maybe I'm not so old, after all.
By the way... along with this blog, this story is also available on Twitter and Facebook. Not that anyone will notice, of course.
Somewhere, just the fax, ma'am.
Andrew Joseph
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