Hi, this is Frank Romano for WhatTheyThink.com.  I came upon this interesting article.  It says, “Legislators should not make the iPad transition.”  I love this.  It’s from Indiana.  “Indiana’s legislators’ inclination towards use of iPads instead of paper is ludicrous,” according to this article.  What they’re trying to do is to give the 50 senators and 100 representatives for the state legislator iPads. 

And they say by doing this that they can save printing and it will allow the legislators to make decisions more rapidly.  I don't believe that for one instant.  So this article is arguing the point.  The whole thing would cost $105,000 and they're doubtful that it will save $105,000 in printing and they're trying to use that money for other purposes.  Then, they make this interesting point here that they have to train the legislators on the iPad.  These are legislators, so it’s going to take awhile to get them to learn to use a simple tablet device.  

I see this, by the way, in a lot of places.  They’re starting to replace paper in government with iPads.  Many, many years ago, I was hired by the government to help them.  When Jimmy Carter was president, he didn't like the typeface for one of the things he read and so I helped him to develop a typesetting system that would give him what he wanted.  Then, years later, under Reagan, I was hired because they were printing a very short run of special publication for a very select group of people in government and I helped them get into digital printing to deal with that.  Today, that publication is read on an iPad by the president and the small group of people.  So they’ve made that transition.  I hope they encrypt it very well.  

So the big argument about whether we should be replacing paper with tablets, of course, they’re using the iPad, the $499 to $899 price tag.  Of course, the new Kindle Fire is $199, so one could make a case that they are getting cheaper.  But I can envision the day when the legislator says, “Well, I can do my job because I can't get online,” or, “It’s not connecting,” or, “I think I’ve been hacked.”  One can see that. 

So, in any case, here’s a case where, again, we’re using electronic devices to substitute for printing.  And I think we have to kind of review this carefully as to whether this is the best approach.  

Or perhaps it is a good idea but it must be balanced with some form of paper so that they can at least review the material in hardcopy form, mostly for annotation, although they may actually learn how to do that, as time goes on.  So, in any case, that's my opinion.