Someday, when society goes fully paperless, paper cuts will be a thing of the past

pruwyben@discuss.tchncs.de to Showerthoughts@lemmy.world – 161 points –
44

People will start cutting themselves on razorthin smartphones instead.

Society will never go fully paperless. If we would have it would have been around 1998. Though I suppose depending on which apocalypse scenario gets us, there will be a time when paper cuts are a rarity only suffered by the few brave souls who scavenge the ruins of the Before Times.

-98?

How?

Mobile data connections were dogshit even here in Finland up until late 00's.

I had to send mail to the government recently and got a freaking paper cut on my tongue as I licked the envelope glue to seal it. 😬

Use a damp sponge next time, unless you write a letter to your lover in the dragon realm. That one should contain your saliva.

unless you write a letter to your lover in the dragon realm

Tell me more! How does one acquire a lover in the dragon realm?

I doubt society will go fully paperless, there are times when you need a thing that can be crushed, folded, whatever and doesn't run out of battery, so unless e-ink technology develops in a very specific way I don't think every eventually will be replaced, and even without purely functional applications I think art would never ever go fully paperless for many data security (leaking art before it's complete), economic (things are more expensive when they're limited in supply, and making either legal or illegal copies of digital things is so much easier) and sentimental reasons (it's just nicer to have something physical) reasons

I'm clumsy enough that I've got a "paper cut" from aluminum foil while preparing dinner.

Paper cut is just one of the way the tree ghost exact revenge, there's plenty of opportunities.

@pruwybn@discuss.tchncs.de

I can see in the future paper cuts becoming an Olympic sport, like sword fighting. People of the future will stand in a ring with two pieces of paper and will try to make a cut on their opponent's piece of artificially grown skin, placed at the center of their chest. People will cheer as the athletes try to cut their opponent with an ancient piece of technology

Are the cuts from packaging different then?

Never heard of cardboard cuts.....

Cardboard cuts are absolutely a thing, like a paper cut on steroids.

I used to work in a warehouse and spent most of my day opening, resealing, making, and breaking down boxes. Spend enough time around them and the boxes will get you.

Yeah but does anyone call them that? I'd still call that kind of fine cut a paper cut.

Never heard anyone say "ow I've got a cardboard cut"

We do at my warehouse. They are usually worse than a standard papercut so the distinction does say something

We definitely called them cardboard cuts, can't say how universal it is but every job I've where I've handled a lot of boxes it seems to be in pretty common use

My friend and I call it a box cut because they’re often worse than a normal paper cut due to fibers that can cause additional irritation unless cleaned out.

Don’t forget the extreme dryness ptsd_dog.png

Definitely, normally my skin is pretty resilient, never really been someone who needs to spend money on moisturizers and such, I could probably just about wash my hands with acetone and steel wool and be none the worse for it.

But there were a few times when I worked there that my hands were getting noticeably dryer than usual, pretty sure if my skin were any more delicate I would have been in pretty rough shape.

if a papercut is like being cut with a switchblade, a cardboard cut is like being cut with a saw.

Oh there's plenty of paper and non-paper out there to do the same damage. Ever cut yourself on cardboard? How about those plastic straps they put around heavy boxes and packages? Or my personal favorite, splinters and burrs. Glass, rock, metal, sheets of plastic - anything thin will do if you hit it at just the right angle. It's a tossup as to which bonus location is worse, under the fingernail or across the finger webbing. Or if you're REALLY unlucky, the eye. a scratched cornea is no joke. Wear your safety glasses kids.

Yeah but the PCB inside the paperless device would be as sharp as a paper, not to mention the component thin legs such as electrolytic capacitors (although the majority of electronic components are tiny blocks surface-mounted, there are components that need to be welded in a THT (through-hole) fashion because their electrical contents can't fit the small space of a SMD).

Aren't they already?

I got my pet meds handed to me in a paper bag and somehow managed to give myself a paper cut getting the cat into the car while holding this bag. It was the first paper cut I've had in years, and my reaction was "I wonder if this is still recyclable." Still better than plastic bags, I suppose.

This post was inspired by me wondering how I got one. I'm pretty sure it was from opening junk mail, one of the few ways I interact with paper anymore.

Imagine the paradise slaves were living under, they could never be the victims of pay cuts.