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Pens and landlines fading away [New Straits Time (Malaysia)](New Straits Time (Malaysia) Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) IT is getting real hard for doyens to remain relevant in this age of smart-this and e-that. Just a few weeks after I wrote about the typewriter fighting back for a second wind, there is now the latest round of news reports concerning the fate of pens and pencils, and also the possibility of the old fixed-line telephone ending up as museum pieces. Pens and pencils are slowly fading from the sphere, there is no doubt about that. The notebook and foolscap paper will inevitably join them, leaving a trail that is so enchanting and sentimental. A news story in The Wall Street Journal last week quoted manufacturers as saying these items were surviving in the market, but only because the makers were being innovative, and also because of demand from emerging economies. "Some, including Crayola LLC of the US and Germany's Staedtler, are embracing the digital revolution with electronic products. Crayola's Digitools - a range of plastic, rubber-tipped tools - let children stamp, brush and paint designs on a tablet through a free accompanying Crayola app. "Staedtler introduced the Digital Pen 990, which works as a regular ballpoint pen, while simultaneously converting everything that is written into electronic files. A receiver clip fastened to the notepad copies and stores about a hundred pages of writing in up to 30 languages," the story went. How smart. However, no matter how hard it is for professional operations to go paperless, the digital revolution trudges on like a juggernaut, shoving aside the old ways. Nowadays, even reporters on the job have gone without the once-essential pens or pencils and paper notebooks, as they move along with tablets and smartphones. No, these tablets are not the pharmaceutical type. The days of reporters creating their own shorthand writing are also over. More significantly, notes of interviews are no longer scribbled and kept in paper notebooks. I remember the BiC and Othello ballpoint pens bursting onto the scene in the early and mid-1960s, when the classroom staple, apart from the chalk and blackboard, was just the pencil and, occasionally, the crayon. BiC, with its distinctive yellow frame and blue or red cap, caught everyone by storm, mainly because it was widely available and cheap, selling at less than RM1 each. The sweeping popularity of the ball pen was also because it was user-friendly and, unlike the fountain pen, was disposable and, therefore, did not need refilling. You threw it away after quite a lengthy period of use. In fact, it got so popular that it was banned in most classrooms, as teachers were buttoned-down with the traditional use of the pencil and fountain pen. And, as you know, even the fountain pen, which requires a refill of ink (most of the time Quink) is fading into the sunset. The pencil is barely holding its own, thanks mainly to its special usage, including in objective examinations. The Luna coloured pencils by Staedtler, which used to cost RM1 (now RM7), could be next in line, together with the Oxford geometry box. The foolscap paper? Today's youngsters may be left wondering what it is and whose cap it is going to end up on. As for the fixed-line telephone, another news report a few days ago said it all - that it was a thing of the past. This came after a survey which found that many subscribers used the home telephone only eight times or less a month, some even no longer remembering the phone number. According to The Daily Mail, a poll of 2,000 adults found that more than half rarely or never used their landline. Once the preferred method for contacting friends and family, one in 10 said they did not even keep a home phone plugged in any more. The survey, by Relish Broadband, found the top reason for keeping a landline telephone was the need for an Internet connection: making regular personal phone calls came fifth. The situation is very much the same in Malaysia, where most people, whether 8 or 80, own mobile phones, some more than one each. This is virtually pushing the fixed-line telephone into oblivion. As it is, its "loyal assistant", the ubiquitous and extremely bulky telephone directory, which came with the yellow pages, is already gone, while old-school telephone operators have also disappeared. It has been 14 years since the number of mobile phone subscribers in Malaysia overtook those on fixed lines. And right now, the gap has stretched beyond our dreams. As of last year, there were four million landline subscribers in this country of 30 million people. Mobile phones? Almost 37 million. (c) 2014 ProQuest Information and Learning Company; All Rights Reserved. |