Slashdot Mirror
New Font Uses Holes To Cut Ink Use
An anonymous reader writes "A Dutch company has taken an open source Sans Serif font and
added holes to it to try and save on printer ink costs. The Ecofont is claimed to save up to 20 percent of ink costs, but it allegedly took the firm a while to perfect the ratio of the maximum number of holes possible without sacrificing readability."
Looks interesting, but probably not very practical. Surely simply printing in draft mode and in grey-scale is an easier way? On screen this is probably going to be more headache than its worth.
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
These people don't seem aware that typefaces are usually available in many weights.
You can save much more than this by simply changing to a lighter weight.
(I am a typographer. But it shouldn't take one to figure this out.)
you had me at #!
At big sizes the holes make it look horrible. At small sizes it's not all that readable as far as fonts go.
You might as well print at 80% grey instead of black to get the same savings and have it look better.
"Unfortunately, the font is only available at 120pt or higher, so it will takes twelve times the paper to print out your book report."
I'm willing to make that sacrifice if it means saving Mother Earth!
Just imagine how many electrons could be saved if people used this font in their browser.
I Am My Own Worst Enemy
Tell you what, when you can come up with a better way to save 20% of the ink used on a printed document, then you can say it's stupid. Until then, I think it's a cleverly simple idea.
+1 IDisagreeSoHeMustBeATrollOrAnAstroturferOrAShill
I have a way to save 100%. Don't print it!
will it save while I view documents on my ereader?
I prefer to use Inverted Ecofont, in which everything else is removed and only the holes remain. This saves 80% of the ink, and it known to some people as "dot-matrix draft mode".
This is new font is stupid and not news.
I agree. Their idea is redundant as most letters come pre-made with holes in them.
If you have something that you dont want anyone to know, maybe you shouldnt be doing it in the first place -Eric Schmidt
f u cn rd ths u cn sv on prntg cst...
ask me how!
This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
But for those that do need to be on paper, you can save 20% just by using a 10 point font instead of a 12 point font!
This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
You forgot the clever part.
Poke holes in the cookies before serving. The cookies are now 20% healthier!
I printed off a quick test to an HP LaserJet 4100 from Word 2007 in WinXP, and it looks a lot better in print than on screen. 10 & 11 point being where it looks best. You can still see the holes, but they're not as glaringly obvious or jagged as when displayed on screen.
Paper trees are always re-planted after being cut down (it would get unsustainable very quickly if this didn't happen) - and generally also have a lot of recycled material in the final product. The tree-cutting damage comes from the food industry clearing the way for beef cows or corn crops.
Never mind how insanely expensive ink is. The wasted ink is by far worse than the wasted paper. If you want to save a few sheets, shrink your print margins; either way, there's really no net gain or loss in trees.
How are sites slashdotted when nobody reads TFAs?
Go stick your head in a pig!
I have a much better one, change the quality settings in the printing dialog. There you have it ..
I doubt it will be less readable than that crap and it will also work for all fonts and images and so on ..
The eco-boat.
"To those who are overly cautious, everything is impossible. "
Really, guys. I'm not that funny.
"The cup is in turn designed for holding hot or cold liquids, and has an open rim and closed base." --US Patent #5425497
I read Slashdot today, oh boy
Four thousand holes in ecofont sans serif
And though the holes were very small
They had to count them all
Now they know how many holes it takes to fill "the Albert Hall"
I'd love to turn you on
Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
I don't know for you but for me 99.9% of the paper I consumed won't be readable in a year, because I will have thrown it away.
Text-files? I'm sure they will.
PDF? No idea.
Coming from a University that bought 10 pallets a year of paper and a truck load of toner, it's a big cost. Switching fonts to save 20% would be a very nice savings.
Tim Smith - Ramblings from Nerd Land
At work we have one of those industrial printers that puts a header page with the name of the person doing the print job in big ahead of the job. Then we more or less 'sort' them on tables for people to come an pick up. There are users with thousands of pages accumulated over a few weeks gathering dust in a huge pile.
Since there are printing costs overruns, I suggested we should charge people by the number of pages not picked up at the end of the month. My suggestion was quickly shot down. I'll never make it into management.
Non-Linux Penguins ?
Your ideas intrigue me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.
Unfortunately, since you don't take ink seriously, I'm guessing you are spending too much printing your newsletter and will be out of business shortly.
In our University, printing used to be free until 2 years ago. Since the university started charging 3 cents per printout, the total number of printouts taken in computer labs has gone down by 70%. Perhaps your univ should try that out as well.
Face your daemons!
I cal kill 20-25% more trees with one toner cartridge!
Engineering is the art of compromise.
Sigh. As the various outraged typographers here attest, this is a self-promotional stunt and has nothing to do with innovation or even typography. The clue is the first line of TFA:
"Dutch marketing and communications company Spranq has come up with a novel and free way of slashing printer ink costs by developing a font with holes in it."
I work for a marcomms agency as well. This is how such agencies get clients: you pull stunts like this to make yourselves look like gurus in some way, so when you go in for pitches you have lots of press clippings (clients don't read them, they just look at where they were published) so you have some kind of differentiation over your rivals. I worked for a place where we made a big fanfare about recruiting an "artist in residence" (and got lots of press) - others in our space have launched "labs" or various kinds, etc. etc.
There's no substance in any of it. It's all just a marketing con-job and sad to say Slashdot has fallen for it (not that a marcomms agency's clients would be interested in a /. story anyway).
"And the meaning of words; when they cease to function; when will it start worrying you?"
f u cn rd ths u cn
I blushed when I read this: "fxxx xxu cxnx, rxdx thxs xxu cxnx"
Virtual Betting on Facebook for non-geeks.
Deforestation is almost exclusively the result of agricultural expansion. It makes no sense to say that saving paper = saving forests.
Here is what Wikipedia has to say about the matter:
Even when deforestation is the result of lumber harvesting activities, it is primarily because the roads used to access the lumber make it easier for farmers to move in and use the land.
While forest area is on the decline in the US, it is due to urbanization, not timber harvesting activities (the same article discusses this).
First of all, the idea that everything required for the class should be included in the price of the class is ridiculous. Books aren't included. Neither are pens, paper, or laptops.
Second, what difference does it make whether you pay for your printing at the printer or in your tuition? Theoretically speaking, if nobody abused their printing privileges, the cost would average out and the cost to you would be the same either way.
However, if charging three cents at the printer reduces abuse, then you, as a student, actually save money. Even if you're one of the students that's abusing your printing privileges, you'd still save money because you don't have to pay for all the other students that are abusing their privileges. Putting all the cost in the tuition causes the tragedy of the commons.
My college actually charged nine cents per page; it was really no big deal. Although I'm curious if the GP meant three cents per page, or three cents per job. If it's per page, the 70% drop doesn't surprise me too much, but if it's per job, then that's pretty amazing.
The details are trivial and useless; The reasons, as always, purely human ones.
Mod parent interesting, insightful, and informative.
It seems counter-intuitive, but if we stopped using wood completely, then forested land would no longer be profitable! If that happened, people would just replace the forested land with something that is profitable, like housing developments or farms.
I agree that deforestation is a big problem, particularly in third-world countries, but reducing paper use could reduce reforestation, which would cause more harm than good.
I think it's more important that we focus on passing laws to protect natural habitats; when forced to, logging companies have no problems making the most with the land they own.
The details are trivial and useless; The reasons, as always, purely human ones.