July 15th, 2009
Irony Alert: New York City pays $1 million for typewriters
Here we are complaining about users who don’t upgrade from Windows XP.
But what about updating to computers and printers altogether?
A story in the New York Post this morning notes that New York City is paying nearly $1 million on typewriters for NYPD police officers.
The Post reports:
Despite the adoption of high-tech equipment that can read license plates from the air and detect radiological events before they happen, manual and electric typewriters continue to be used throughout the NYPD — and they won’t be phased out anytime soon, officials told The Post.
In fact, just last year, the city signed a $982,269 contract with New Jersey-based Swintec for the purchase of thousands of new manual and electric typewriters over the next three years — some of which retail for as much as $649 apiece.
And last month, the city signed a $99,570 deal with Afax Business Machines in Manhattan for the maintenance of its existing Brother, Panasonic and IBM Selectric typewriters.
Apparently, though most of the NYPD’s arrest-report forms have been computerized, officers still use typewriters to fill out property and evidence vouchers that are printed on carbon-paper forms.
There’s even a quote in the article noting that officers scramble for ribbons when they run out.
Ctrl+P, anyone?
Andrew J. Nusca is an associate editor for ZDNet and SmartPlanet.
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| 07/15/09
