Disappearing ink 30 Apr 2008

Following on nicely from Monday's post on disappearing movies, CNET News reports on a new printer-paper combo from Xerox PARC that produces documents that fade away after 16 to 24 hours.

How might this technology be used? Well, a restaurant, for instance, could print its daily specials on a piece of paper, attach these pieces of paper to menus, and then collect the sheets of by-then-blank paper the next morning to run through the printer all over again. Since the same sheets of paper can be run through the printer hundreds of times, this process helps save the rainforests. And it reduces energy consumption too (as recycling a sheet of paper takes about 114,000 joules, while making a new sheet of paper takes around 204,000 joules).