Digital BW, The Print

Stephen,

Surely the obvious reason is that if American industry wants to sell any 
paper, paper-handling machinery - printers, copiers,  or folders etc for 
filing, it has to make two versions, one for its own market and one for the 
rest of the world. That costs.

Here's are some quotes from that article on paper sizes that I listed 
earlier:-
http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~mgk25/iso-paper.html

"Globalization starts with getting the details right. Inconsistent use of SI 
units and international standard paper sizes remain today a primary cause 
for U.S. businesses failing to meet the expectations of the global economy. 
"
"Users of photocopiers outside the U.S. and Canada usually take it for 
granted that the machine is able to enlarge A4 ? A3 or reduce A3 ? A4, the 
two paper formats usually kept in machines with two paper trays. When they 
use a copier in North America, it often comes as a disappointing surprise 
when they find out that magnifying an entire page is not a function 
available there. The absence of this useful capability is a direct result of 
the unfortunate design of the U.S. paper formats. North American copiers 
usually also have two or more paper trays, but these are mostly used for the 
two very similar "Letter" and "Legal" formats, wasting the opportunity of 
offering a highly useful magnifying capability. Any enlarging of a "Letter" 
page onto "Legal" paper will always chop off margins and is therefore of 
little use. The Legal format itself is quite rarely used, the notion that it 
is for "legal" work is a popular myth; the vast majority of U.S. legal 
documents are actually using the "Letter" format. Some copiers also offer in 
addition or instead the next larger "Ledger" format, but that again has a 
different aspect ratio and will therefore change the margins of a document 
during magnification or reduction. "

"If you purchase new office or printing equipment in North America, it might 
be wise to pay attention whether the equipment is suitable for use with A4 
paper. When you make inquiries, best indicate to vendors that ISO 216 
compatibility of equipment is of concern to you. "

"Universities in the U.S. increasingly use A4 size paper in laser printers 
and library copying machines, because most conferences outside North America 
require papers to be submitted in A4 format and many journals and conference 
proceedings are printed in A4 format. "

"The three-hole 70-mm filing system widely used in the U.S. is not 
compatible with the two-hole 80-mm ISO system used in most other countries. 
The three-hole system could of course also be used on A4 pages, but many 
files with a three-hole mechanism are only designed for U.S. "Letter" sheets 
and are not tall enough to reliably protect A4 pages. Another disadvantage 
of the three-hole system is that it is not suitable for storing formats 
smaller than U.S. "Letter". "

Enough reasons surely?

Bob Frost.

----- Original Message ----- 

From: "Stephen Billard" <stephen@...>


Why should the US change? So far I have not seen an argument.