« Pets are People, Too | Main | Piracy of the Sith »

May 18, 2005

Backspace Key v. Wite-Out

The caption to the cartoon at left states: "Ed could tell that the new secretary was not working out when he found her using Wite-Out to get rid of spam e-mails."

Joking aside, computers have changed the way we use Wite-Out. Intuitively, one would think that the use of computers, and the backspace key, would have all but eliminated the Wite-Out industry. However, this isn't so. In fact, it's a $120 million annual business, according to the New York Times article A Backspace Key Can't Fix Everything. Rather than shrink, the business is actually growing at about 2 percent a year. While this may not seem very impressive, it is extremely counterintuitive.

Wite-Out has evolved to include correction tape, along with new and fun containers for Wite-Out. This is an interesting lesson on how to evolve in a field.

Posted by Melody Wirz at 05:01 PM.
Permalink: Backspace Key v. Wite-Out
| Sphere: Related Content