Pen and paper trump tech

Is it funny that we need justification or validation (in fact I am reading on a book on it!) instead of just saying 'duh' working with your hands brings more satisfaction and therefore better results? Computers and keyboards are incredibly important tools and they can be used creatively but the interaction between hand, eye, pen paper and brain still has yet to be equaled for creativity and imprinting concepts in the mind.

Pen and paper trump tech
In a world of impersonal gadgets, techies are turning to tactile pleasures

By MEG McCONAHEY
THE PRESS DEMOCRAT

Silicon Valley forecaster Paul Saffo has been tracking electronic bill-paying since 1985. He's advised some of the world's largest banks and financial centers on e-banking.
But the man who is the ultimate "early adopter," who tests out virtually every new high-tech gadget before it's released to the public, uses cash over a debit card, still writes a lot of paper checks, keeps a handwritten journal and prefers to consult a paper calendar over his PDA.
Sometimes it's just easier that way.
"I don't trust the security of the debit card system," he says. "And I like the anonymity of cash. It's not that I'm doing anything illegal. But cash serves my purpose. It matches my style."
Despite all this, not to mention his recent rediscovery of the wonders of Rapidograph pens -- the mainstay for designers before hand-drawing was supplanted by computers -- Saffo is hardly a refusenik in the high-tech revolution.
As an associate professor at Stanford University, he's one of the most recognized voices on the tech scene, lecturing on the impact of technological change on society and the future. Yet he is not alone among people dialed into the digital world who find themselves, in some instances, gravitating toward tactile over high-tech tools. They're doing this at the same time ever more gadgetry streams into our lives, beeping for us to adopt it and love it.