The U.S. Army saves more than a billion dollars by using IBM Lotus to eliminate paper forms.

By Chris Smith

People have been using paper to write on for more than 5,000 years, so it's not surprising that there is resistance to giving it up in the workplace, even when it's more cost-efficient to do so.

The papyrus plant was used to make a form of paper in ancient Egypt as early as 3500 BC. Modern paper is believed to have originated in China around 200 AD and migrated to Europe in the early 12th century. When the production of paper became mechanized in the early 19th century, the hoi polloi (that's Joe six-pack) got their first taste of mass information from inexpensive books and newspapers.

The key to efficient management is the coordinated capture, storage, use, distribution, and retention of documents.

By Mark Firmin

What do a Las Vegas resort, an international consumer products manufacturer, a rust-belt industrial conglomerate, a public utility, and a distribution company have in common? Fundamentally, they share an abiding need for documents with which to do business and a system of records to keep track of them.

This is one company's story about transitioning to an environmentally aware company.

By Dan Forster

Ours was a typical office as offices go. Free coffee or tea in Styrofoam cups, copier with sorter, printers everywhere, bottled water in the staff kitchen fridge, which was also replete with Styrofoam containers of forgotten leftover meals. And a staff completely oblivious to the impact they make on our environment.

Automating reports and distributing documents electronically is both good for the planet and great for the bottom line.

By Chris Smith

We don't have detailed demographics on all our MC Press Online readers, but my guess is there aren't too many who were working on computers in the early 1960s when IBM coined the term "spool file."

The acronym stands for Simultaneous Peripheral Operation On-Line (SPOOL), but folklore has it that the name actually was conceived after the term "spool" came into widespread use, since a spool is what is used to wind magnetic tape.

Universal payment platforms provide a range of options for paper payments, electronic payments, and the distribution of payment documentation in paper or electronic form.

By Mark Firmin

Throughout the corporate world, managements are waging a war on paper. The new medium for corporate "paperwork" (transactions ranging from bids and contracts, sales and purchase orders, documents and reports, to financial settlements and more) is electronic.