Letters, feedback, get it off your chest: 20 December 07

What readers had to say about last week's news.

Re: Rudd takes the axe to printing
 
Is the PIAA's outrage over proposed cuts to MPs printing allowances really warranted? 226 MPs with $100K each to spend on print is still $22.6 million and you may recall there was a scandal about abuse of Qld MP's print allowances ('PrintGate' as Peter Beattie dubbed it) under the Howard increase and roll-over policy.
 
Not sure how others found political print direct mail in the run-up to the election but the stuff I received (mostly from the Libs) was poorly written, poorly designed, with benign messages and virtually no informational value whatsoever. Straight in the bin.
 
Candidate posters are invariably cheesy and insincere - Howard's in Bennelong was specially so, whereas McKew's was fresh, used yellow and ... well she's pleasing on the eye anyway.
 
If we as an industry cry foul every time an organisation cuts a print budget (or limits junk mail as with recent Mosman Council ruling), we will be seen as wantonly advocating profligate resource wasting and environmental pollution. Why not roll with the punch and help those with messages to convey get better value out of their printed communications by good design and content, and targeted direct delivery. With shorter or variable content runs, printers make more profit.
 
Think of oil companies protesting energy-efficient cars that reduce petrol consumption. Highly popular eh?
 
It doesn't need to equate to hurting the industry. We just need to print smarter, greener, add value, not print garbage and position our industry appropriately in today's information economy. Look at the printers doing all this - they are going gangbusters.
 
Kind regards
 
Andy McCourt