HP CEO: Printed Pages Are Down 20% Since Pandemic (theregister.com) 83
HP is facing something of a challenge as the number of printed pages has decreased by 20% since the pandemic. "On the office space, clearly, the amount of pages that is being printed is lower than before the pandemic," HP boss Enrique Lores told tech investors at Bernstein's 40th Annual Strategic Decision Conference last week. "And this is really driven by what we call hybrid work. There are less people in the office every day, and this has driven the amount of pages down." The Register reports: "I use pages as a proxy because, depending on what happens with pages, happens eventually with devices. Before the pandemic, our estimates were that we were expecting to see a 20 percent reduction of printing. And actually, we were looking at the numbers ... and this is more or less where we are." In terms of users printing at home, "during the pandemic, we saw a spike of pages printed, and since then, the number of pages has been declining," Lores added. The levels are not unexpected, though, he said. The industrial customer base was "impacted during the last two or three years by a reduction of capital investments," but recovery is showing up, with those customers printing more labels and packaging. Previous research by IDC showed around 450 billion fewer pages were printed in homes and office worldwide in 2020 versus the year before the pandemic, equating to a 19 percent plunge. It merely accelerated the long-term trend. [...]
Solution: Paper with DRM (Score:5, Funny)
You will see!
Re:Solution: Paper with DRM (Score:4, Funny)
Stop giving them ideas.
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DONE: "Never run out of paper again1. Instant Ink now offers the convenience of having responsibly-sourced 8.5 x 11 in., 20 lb, 96 Bright HP Paper delivered before you need it1 - just like ink!" https://www.hpsmart.com/us/en/... [hpsmart.com]
Forestry (Score:2)
That probably means 20% of the woodlands will be sold for development if the paper isn't used.
Re:Forestry (Score:5, Informative)
That probably means 20% of the woodlands will be sold for development if the paper isn't used.
Copy paper is only one part of the paper market.
There's also cardboard, packaging, toilet paper, paper towels, newsprint, etc.
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Don't forget non-paper uses for wood like construction lumber, particle board, furniture, plywood, etc...
Though with MJ being legalized/decriminalized, supposedly Hemp might take over from wood for the pulp, apparently it can make amazing paper. But then, I've heard the same thing for things like bamboo.
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Don't forget non-paper uses for wood like construction lumber, particle board, furniture, plywood, etc...
Though with MJ being legalized/decriminalized, supposedly Hemp might take over from wood for the pulp, apparently it can make amazing paper. But then, I've heard the same thing for things like bamboo.
Bamboo makes incredible TP and paper towels.
Printer (Score:3)
I had to buy an HP printer during the pandemic and it was utter garbage. A 30 page PDF would completely empty brand new ink cartridges.
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I didn't buy it at Amazon, but I was forced to buy this particular piece of shit because it was during the pandemic and it was the only printer I could find. You're a dickhead by the way.
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Also I own a bw Brother laser printer but I needed color.
Re:Printer (Score:5, Interesting)
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A 30 page PDF would completely empty brand new ink cartridges.
It sounds like you're talking about the sample cartridges in the new printer. No print cartridges, not even HP ones would run out if you were just printing 30 pages, even if they were full A4 sized colour photos.
No doubt HP will be lying through their teeth and you won't get 300 pages, but 30 is being equally dishonest.
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I had to buy an HP printer during the pandemic and it was utter garbage. A 30 page PDF would completely empty brand new ink cartridges.
I don't know of a better stock to short... but I don't gamble. :)
Non Sequitur (Score:5, Insightful)
It seems more likely the "rip off ink" business model is bearing market decline.
Resentments spread like a virus.
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This. Hopefully it spreads to their other businesses as well. Personally I've already scratched HP off the list for server purchases due to their printer shenanigans.
Don't bite the hand that feeds you!
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I get the sentiment, but HPE, (servers,) is a different company from HP, (printers.)
Still, avoid them anyway. The most recent Proliants are trash.
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Beyond the information mishandling and everything-as-a-subscription model, HPE servers are overpriced like HP's ink cartridges. The list price is pretty easily six times what Supermicro charges for a comparable server.
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While I hate "rip off ink" as much as anyone, I'd say the decline has more to do with people having more paperless options, and younger people becoming more comfortable with them. Many older people still want hard copies to hold, but these days it's *finally* possible to even buy a house without stacks of paper. I literally get no bills in the mail these days (they're all electronic), but my older neighbor still does.
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Or maybe it's because people have access to equipment they need.
When you're in the office a
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The things I stopped printing were airline confirmations, eventbrite tickets, and tax returns (for "safe keeping"). The only thing left is shipping labels, I have to go to a store to print those.
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The black toner alone for the HP printers we have is 1000% of the price of the toner for the SHARP printers, and they're flimsy AF. And every so often they just stop printing until power cycled.
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HP has realized this. Look at the "Smart Tank" printers from HP. Much more affordable supplies.
HP inkjet cartridges are expensive.... (Score:3)
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I actually have a 10+ year old HP multifunction color laser - but it's the bottom of their commercial line, not their home line. I certainly wouldn't go HP today. But as long as my machine works.
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Traditionally, HP printers were workhorses, though their drivers have always been somewhere between suspect and flakey (maybe because they wrote new drivers for every model from scratch).
They pissed it away completely with their business practices, and now their hardware is crap, too.
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I've got a multifunction monochrome Brothers laser printer. It was inexpensive, works fine and it is very cheap to operate.
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My newest home printer is a Brother color laser MFP. Love it. I scan more than I print, so it sits for long periods idle. No clogged jets, no empty ink cartridges from cleaning the print head, and it seems to stay connected to the WiFi reliably even if I don't touch it for weeks at a time. (I did get a cover for it, to keep the dust out.)
Current Brother color laser... (Score:2)
... I wonder if the current ones (all in one including fax) are still good.
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... I wonder if the current ones (all in one including fax) are still good.
I have three I'm supporting that were switched from HP printers. Previously, I would have tickets come in for disconnect, randomly being signed out of their HP account (needed for scanning), the printer being unresponsive until after a reboot. After switching these three over to Brother, the tickets stopped.
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Which all-in-one color laser, with fax, models?
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Which all-in-one color laser, with fax, models?
I'm supporting two Brother MFC-J4535DW and one Brother MFC-J6955DW
Printer prices jumped 100% (Score:3)
Everybody needed a home office. Can't be like that forever. You made bank thanks to a tragedy. Go bemoan in silence that things are better now.
Re:Who the hell needs a printer in a home office? (Score:5, Interesting)
It makes no sense. Who are you going to hand the printed page to? Yourself?
Marking pieces of paper with pens, pencils, and highlighters to flag items and track relationships is an easier and richer experience than trying to do the same with a keyboard and screen. Also, sometimes you want to have several or many pages in view simultaneously, because 'Random Access' isn't just for computer memory. Unless you have a huge high-res screen, trying to use a monitor in this way is a pain.
At least for me, the random access I mentioned above also applies to books, which is why I prefer dead tree books to eBooks. When reading fiction I often go many pages back to confirm my memory, and eBooks don't provide the visual cues and context for that. And when I'm looking at a long component datasheet, flipping back and forth quickly and repeatedly between, say, a specs page and an app notes page is just second nature. Looking at a PDF on the screen just isn't as good.
For some types of work - and play - there simply is no substitute for the printed page.
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Don't pay any attention to this asshole, he's a troll.
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Don't pay any attention to this asshole, he's a troll.
I'll own the "asshole" epithet, on occasion. But I never troll, at least not intentionally. What is it about my comment that made you think I was trolling?
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Paper doesn't need batteries or to be plugged in to work. You can store them for hundreds of years and they are still readable. OS and product upgrades don't affect them.
Fuck you HP (Score:4, Funny)
Time to panic (Score:5, Insightful)
Oh no! Consumers are consuming less! What ever shall we do?!?
Somewhere on our planet, the world's smallest violin is playing for this man.
Fuck our corporate overlords.
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And yet... (Score:1)
...you took the time to post on this site.
So either that means the site isn't that worthless, or your post is.
Or perhaps both?
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Paper is soooo 2019 (Score:2, Interesting)
Re: Paper is soooo 2019 (Score:2)
Could be an opportunity, but focused on the past. (Score:2)
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My problem with HP is that they won't let Windows do the job. They want to install all their extra crapware on your computer along with the drivers. Hundreds of megs of shit for what should be a few hundred k of driver.
Duh! (Score:2)
In other words... (Score:5, Informative)
HP CEO admits their drivers and/or the printers themselves report your printer usage to the HP mothership.
Re: In other words... (Score:2)
The subscription/internet spying program is not only pushed on new buyers but also coerced as part of installing software/driver packages. They've quite embraced the practice of just repeatedly asking until they get the answer they want. Of course it's likely that they just steal all the data without consent anyway.
About time (Score:3)
All I can say is that itâ(TM)s about time. The reason I say that is because thereâ(TM)s a tremendous amount of stuff being printed that really didnâ(TM)t need to be in the first place.
At our local hospital for example, radiology orders are printed out. The technologist then optically scans that order into another system and shreds the paper. The printout literally exists for a matter of minutes. More stuff like this goes on in the business setting than youâ(TM)d imagine.
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The technologist then optically scans that order into another system and shreds the paper.
My workplace went through a multi-year endeavor to scan all of our historic documents, and making most (if not all) of our software generate all documents in digital form (nearly all being PDF) which are all accessible from all approved mobile devices and desktops.
We have people in some departments that will print those documents, read them, then shred them.
Re: About time (Score:2)
The technologist then optically scans that order into another system and shreds the paper.
Mandatory SOPs. In an environment susceptible to massive malpractice lawsuits. Different departments went paperless at different times. Procedures were developed to bridge the gap. And then never revisited.
Same thing happened at Boeing a few decades ago. Clerical workers had a process that invovled pressing the PF12 key on a 3270 terminal to generate a paper report. Which would be delivered the next day in the company mail on 132 column tractor-feed paper. When we rehosted the process to the Web, some of t
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The medical profession has struggled for years with digitizing records. There's requirements in federal law these day, specifically requirements of making those records available electronically to other providers in the same medical group.
My doctor dropped out of all but one medical groups because they each had their own different software, all of it flakey to the point they needed separate computers (expensive laptops so he could use them in the exam rooms) for each medical group because they wouldn't play
Cause for celebration! (Score:2)
I'm pretty sure this is due in large part (Score:5, Insightful)
to the insane cost of printer ink and evil printer firmwares that refuse to print for spurious, corporate-greed-driven reasons.
I for one have naturally gravitated towards as much paperlessness as possible, not because I wanted to or because I cared that much about the environment, but because printers piss the hell out of me.
Printing should be a solved problem that should always work and cost pennies to use, like USB mice or memory fobs. And it should have been for decades now. It still isn't solely because of printer manufacturers.
There's a special place in hell for printer makers. But the silver lining is, they are actively driving people away from printing and ultimately killing trees to make printing paper.
Pages as a proxy? (Score:2)
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Think about an office environment with a boss looking at the budget and comparing printer cost to printer use.
It's quite easy to say, "I don't care if you have to walk an extra 50 feet, we're reducing the number of printers we have because the use doesn't justify the expense of our current numbers".
Re: Pages as a proxy? (Score:2)
HP and many other manufacturers uses printers as loss leaders. They recoup their costs and profits by selling ink and paper. When consumption of those are down it creates a problem for them. Personally, I don't think the printers should be subsidized in this way. It makes them disposable.
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Perhaps people might buy smaller printers, but the replacement interval for printers is "when they break."
In an office environment, in a company that is a medium to large company, printers are more likely to be rented, perhaps with paper and servicing thrown in -- in this scenario, they are likely to be replaced long before they break.
Printing (Score:2)
Stuff is still getting 'printed' its just that it is being printed to a .PDF file and shared over the network. Saving money (and trees)
This is why work from home is under attack (Score:5, Insightful)
Reduced Printing (Score:2)
Before the pandemic, when we all still worked on-site, we thought nothing of printing everything. I would work on projects that generated a lot of paper. Even during development of those projects, I would print hundreds of pages per months while getting the output to be at precise locations on the pages. The cycle would be: Code the positions, do a test print. If something was even slightly off, figure out how much it was off, then repeat.
When the pandemic hit, the bosses asked us if there was anything we d
Large drop with WFH for me (Score:1)
When did you last print anything? (Score:2)
Forget about the ink, when did you actually ever need to print anything? I can't remember printing anything at work for years. At home, I think I used the copy function maybe once, and then maybe a schedule? I expect printing will actually become more and more expensive because only the must-haves will be doing it, and they'll be willing to pay for it.
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Although maybe I don't "need" to, I still print source code and mark it up with a pencil. While archaic, it works for me.
Ugh (Score:3)
"There are less people in the office every day"
FEWER
HP printing is down (Score:2)
IF only HP could innovate (Score:1)
if printed pages count is going down- they will still be safe for a business model- if you need to print a single page or 100 pages.. you still need toner, and a printer...
but i think the real reason for THEIR print count going down is that it counted for consumers printing at home and not the office. Now that return to office is happening, people are printing stuff at work and using office printers- which to be honest, most are NOT HP, but better commercial printers. Plus a wider trend of using digital p
Re: I think I'm going to print a copy of this thre (Score:2)
Is this just HP's numbers? (Score:2)
Work from home and instead of the corporate policy of 'buying HP' for printing maybe they actually choose a more cost effective product.
Over priced vendor lock-in can work both ways HP.
A big revenue problem! (Score:2)
When you make all your profit selling paper and ink, the old bottom line takes a real hit when people stop printing stuff. Maybe HP should start focusing on tech stuff again.