[Air-L] effect of Internet on paper consumption?

[Glenn Pass]

Have you looked at The Myth of the Paperless Office (2001) by Abigail
Sellen and Richard Harper. There is a review with publication details at
http://www.techsoc.com/paperless.htm

I looked at this a little while ago so can't remember the extent to
which the influence of the internet, in particular, is examined. I do
remember the book investigated the relationship between the development
of information management technologies and the growth in paper use. To
quote from the review above: 

"Figures show an almost linear increase in paper use in recent decades:
the introduction of new technology does not get rid of paper; it shifts
the ways in which it is used." 

There were tables and charts depicting the use of timber for paper
products over the past couple decades, although being published in 2001
there aren't recent figures.

I hope this is of some use.

Glenn

********************************************
Glenn Pass
PhD Candidate, Internet Studies
Associate Lecturer, Information Studies
Curtin University of Technology
Perth, Western Australia



-----Original Message-----
From: Hang Ryeol Na [mailto:nhr24 at hotmail.com] 
Sent: Sunday, 30 September 2007 9:35 AM
To: air-l at listserv.aoir.org
Subject: [Air-L] effect of Internet on paper consumption?

Dear all, 
 
I am preparing to write a paper about the effect of internet commerce on
paper consumption in terms of sustainable development. 
As there has been a lot of debate on whether the internet decreased or
increased paper consumption, for example, paperless office, online bill
and payment, etc. I am interested in what factors contributed to the
increase and what others to the decrease. 
 
Do you have any information, or can you provide any resource of the data
showing the effect of internet on paper consumption?
 
If there are any statistics of companies which saved the cost by, for
example, making the customers move from the traditional paper bill to
online bill, it would be great. It would be even greater if any analysis
is available of what made or did not make it possible to save the cost
in such a way. I need to understand why there are both success and
failure in such cases. My focus is on how to decrease the paper
consumption with internet, or, whether it is feasible or not. 
 
Thanks for your consideration. 
 
Sincerely,
 
Hang Ryeol Na
 
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