🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1429@sol.deakin.OZ.AU> Phil Carter writes:
> We are finding that students are using an enormous amount of paper and ink...

In <KIRAVUO.91Jun13212300@vipunen.hut.fi> Timo Kiravuo writes:

> ... [they] can't think any farther than their own nose. Like
> those that print ten copies of a single document instead of using
> a copying machine, since copying costs but printing does not. 

They're being given the wrong signals by the price structure.  If
you want them to think of printing as more expensive than copying,
then _make_ it more expensive!

> The best way may be to educate users. And have them watch their
> peers. 

I don't think so.  You can't educate people that the world is one
way, when all _immediate_ evidence tells them that it patently is
not.  (People seem to have this peculiar tendency to believe the
real world in prefercnce to what people tell them :-)

> We have not yet installed print limits, but it could be done.
> In the comp. sci. lab they had a limit at one time, but I don't
> think that it is in use anymore. And it gets more difficult since
> the systems are more and more distributed.

Yes, implementation of such things is pretty tricky.  (If you're
interested in a _real_ solution to such problems, contact me.)

> One way to limit printing is to get slow lasers instead of fast
> ones.

> One idea is that each printer would be given a weekly amount of
> paper and ink, but that would only mean a big rush to print in
> monday. No use. But instead you could announce in December that
> this years budget for printing is used up, and there shall be no
> printing until you can get an extra budget. What I am aming at is
> to make the users feel that printing is a limited resource that
> they have to care about. None of that idiotic 'there is plenty
> more where that came from' culture.

Not _so_ idiotic, just selfish.  If the paper and ink just keep
appearing, then why think any differently?  Announcements from on
high that there is no more paper or ink will be met with skepticism
and disbelief: "why, a ream of 500 sheets only costs $8 in the
shops, and ink can't be all that expensive!  What's their game?"

I'll agree that this sort of attitude displays a remarkable
short-sightedness and lack of concern for others, but people commonly
behave this way in a large crowd of strangers, especially when they
think nobody is watching.  I believe that people typically don't
have qualms about being selfish when the ones they are depriving
are anonymous: part of a great unknown herd.

If you want a large crowd of users to behave responsibly, then you
have to give them a system in which each individual or clique must
pay for their own usage.  In such an environment they will quickly
form economical and responsible habits.  There's nothing quite like
learning by experience.

If your community of users is quite small, however, then appealing
to their social conscience should work.  (By small, I mean that
everyone is acquainted with almost everyone else.)

--
Andrew Bettison - Softway Pty Ltd

Phone	+61-2-698-2322	  Internet	andrewb@softway.sw.oz.au 
Fax	+61-2-699-9174	  UUCP		uunet!softway.sw.oz.au!andrewb