HP and iPhone could be printing’s saving grace

As more and more businesses across the globe switch to paperless environments and move their data from hard copies to the web, fears that printing may soon become trivial have risen. Hewlett-Packard, however, says it can adapt to the changing times.

The printer giant has introduced an umbrella strategy called “Print 2.0” and it’s touted to change the way people think about printing. At the center of the plan are two jewels: a web-based application called Cloudpoint and the Apple iPhone.

In a nutshell, the idea behind Print 2.0 is built on the fact that most of today’s printed content come from the web. With the introduction of the iPhone, mobile users were given a true OS with a fully functional browser. However, the small screen of the iPhone  raises the need to print things on its browser, so a software solution must be adopted to bridge the gap from cell phone to printer.

That’s where Cloudpoint comes in. By visiting the HP-powered Cloudpoint service site at cloudprint.hpl.hp.com, users will be able to register, enter their number for verification and then select any PC connected to a printer and internet anywhere in the world to print text coming in encoded in PDA form.

“The world is going to flip. We want to ride the wave of the Web,” says HP Labs Internet and Computing Platforms director Patrick Seaglia.

As more and more businesses across the globe switch to paperless environments and move their data from hard copies to the web, fears that printing may soon become trivial have risen. Hewlett-Packard, however, says it can adapt to the changing times.

The printer giant has introduced an umbrella strategy called “Print 2.0” and it’s touted to change the way people think about printing. At the center of the plan are two jewels: a web-based application called Cloudpoint and the Apple iPhone.

In a nutshell, the idea behind Print 2.0 is built on the fact that most of today’s printed content come from the web. With the introduction of the iPhone, mobile users were given a true OS with a fully functional browser. However, the small screen of the iPhone  raises the need to print things on its browser, so a software solution must be adopted to bridge the gap from cell phone to printer.

That’s where Cloudpoint comes in. By visiting the HP-powered Cloudpoint service site at cloudprint.hpl.hp.com, users will be able to register, enter their number for verification and then select any PC connected to a printer and internet anywhere in the world to print text coming in encoded in PDA form.

“The world is going to flip. We want to ride the wave of the Web,” says HP Labs Internet and Computing Platforms director Patrick Seaglia.