The original note, as written at the time
How about this for deliverables for construction projects from an architect? In your bid proposals you could say that instead of submitting hard copies you’re going to submit soft copies this way. In this endeavour you’re trying to discourage the printing of documents and you’re trying to protect your intellectual property. So all your deliverables from feasibility through concept and scheme design are done by soft copy and submitted using company-owned tablets. These tablets are like preview tablets. You submit to the client and they view, so they are wide enough for a person to be able to view the entire drawing without having to keep the tablet for themselves. The client is given time to interface with this tablet, but afterwards when a particular stage is done the tablet is reclaimed. These same tablets can be used during project meetings for previewing of documents and the like. Now beyond scheme design, when you reach detailed design and tender action, you still have the same preview tablets being used for submission of documents, but where printing is required for construction and tendering only details will be submitted. The entire project layout will not be part of the submission. Only details required for the different parts of the construction project will be submitted in hard copy. The rest will still be in tablet format, and those tablets will be at the construction site: in the project meeting room and maybe at various points of the construction site for preview.
Ongoing development
Here is a proposal for architectural deliverables.
In your bid proposals, you state that instead of submitting hard copies you will submit soft copies, distributed on company-owned preview tablets. From feasibility through inception, concept and scheme design, everything is delivered digitally on a device the practice owns and hands over for review. The tablets are wide enough for a client to view an entire drawing without having to keep the tablet for themselves, and the client is given time to use it. When a particular stage is complete, the tablet is reclaimed.
This does several things at once, and I think all of them are worth having.
It discourages printing, which is the obvious benefit and the smallest one. It protects intellectual property without shouting about it, because a device you control is not a PDF that circulates forever. And it gives the client a proper reviewing experience rather than a set of bad prints or a link to a folder of files they will never open.
The more interesting part is what happens after scheme design. At detailed design and tender, the same tablets are used for submission, but where hard copy is genuinely required for construction and tendering, only details are printed. The entire project layout is not part of the hard-copy set. Only the details required for the different parts of construction are issued on paper, and the rest stays in tablet form — with those tablets held at the construction site, in the project meeting room and at various points around the work for preview.
That is a serious reduction in what gets printed, but it is also a serious change in how the site relates to the information. Instead of a roll of drawings that somebody guards and nobody can find, the information sits where the work is, in a form that can be queried. The layout stays current in one place. The paper carries only what a person needs in their hands to build the thing in front of them.
There is a genuine risk and it should be named: a site is dusty, a tablet is fragile, and a contractor who cannot print will find a way to print badly. So the model only works if the device is robust, the power is real, and the practice accepts that it is now supporting a piece of site equipment.
But that is a better problem than what we have now, which is a submission culture that prints everything because printing feels complete, and loses the drawings anyway.