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Old 04-15-2014, 04:18 AM
 
Location: SW France
16,544 posts, read 17,306,171 times
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I just did a google search and found that you can still buy new typewriters in the Uk.

They're Japanese by the sound of the name.
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Old 04-15-2014, 04:32 AM
 
Location: North Carolina
1,764 posts, read 2,851,362 times
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I think it depends on the application. I know of many companies that still had typewriters well into late 1990s/early 2000s because the ability to create/fill in forms on a computer wasn't readily available. This was especially true for forms in duplicate or triplicate (which a typewriter key can hit hard enough to make the necessary impressions underneath). The ability to complete forms has been addressed by Adobe PDFs.
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Old 04-15-2014, 05:45 AM
 
Location: Area 51.5
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Oh, how well I remember the day my office traded my beloved Royal manual for an IBM Selectric. I was in typing heaven. And carbon ribbons.........use one time and get a new one.

Then came the advent of word processors and macros, and life went downhill.

Yes, I mean that.
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Old 04-15-2014, 07:44 AM
 
Location: Brooklyn, New York
445 posts, read 1,442,561 times
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I worked at a law firm for many years before retiring this year. We had an IBM Selectric which we bought refurbished from somewhere in Georgia. We did most of our work on computers, of course, but there were certain forms that needed to be typed, believe it or not.

I remember when an IBM Selectric with the self-correcting feature seemed really high-tech! This was late 70's. By the early 80's, word processors were replacing typewriters only to be replaced by computers. I worked at law firms which generally tended to lag behind in terms of technology. We didn't get computers till the mid-90's.
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Old 04-15-2014, 08:03 AM
 
148 posts, read 261,343 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by chirack View Post
The 80ies were the last decade where the typewriter was in common use. During the 80ies, the typewriter was starting to get replaced and by the 90ies they were replaced by computers. There are countries that use typewriters because manual typewriters don't need electricity and there are probably still oddball uses for them.

Actually the effect the computer had when it replaced the typewriter was kind of huge. The typewriter is very limited(only types) and correcting errors is it's weakness,there are no good ways to correct a typo or edit stuff on paper, only degrees of bad!

In fact you might have type the whole page over again if it has an error. This meant that there were jobs for people who were good at typing(typist or sectary ). With the computer jobs like typist, file clerk and others were greatly reduced in number as companies forced people who before didn't type at all to type.

Before the computer, a manger or other white collar worker didn't type letters or memos. He would have used a sectary to take notes or submitted something hand written(or voice recorded) to an typing pool to be typed. Typing was too much an hassle to tie up your engineers, accountants, lawyers or other kind of worker up with. After the computer(and windows operating system) everybody typed and suddenly companies needed a lot less sectaries and typist. Today, there are very few purely secretarial positions as there were in the past and those left do a lot more than type.

Anyway the transition was from typewriters to "Word Processor" kind of typewriters and computers. The first computers were a little difficult to operate and so the secretary often used it before other people did. With windows(and mac) computers became easier to operate and so everyone used them. The "Word Processor" sort of type writer could store documents in built in memory and had other features like spell check and built in corrective tape, they were cheaper than computers but went out of fashion because computers do more than type.
Yes this exactly - I think 1989 was the last time I used a typewriter. Then on to a word processor (I thought was the greatest thing in the world, lol). Then to my first iMac in 1998.
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Old 04-15-2014, 09:42 AM
 
Location: Atlanta
6,793 posts, read 5,625,985 times
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I think the last time I used one was probably late 80s early 90s. I know that I used to work for a bank and we had a guy that repaired typewrites throughout the branches.. that job did not disappear before I left in 1993 or so. Obviously they are still in use in some places and I suspect many folks just can't convince themselves to throw them away, similar to cassette players or VCRs.

I learned to TYPE on a typewriter back in High School. At the time, typing didn't seem like a skill that I would ever need but I took the class because I thought I could get an easy A (or B)... as it turns out, that class was probably the most beneficial class I took in High School, at least the most beneficial elective class I took!
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Old 04-15-2014, 10:26 AM
 
Location: Wyoming
9,724 posts, read 21,130,734 times
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When I was in college in the late 80s many students were still using typewriters. I had a rather expensive dot matrix printer that I used, then replaced it with a laser printer in '89. Not many people had laser printers in their homes at that time. I got a "cheap" one for $1400. I still had a portable typewriter that I'd drag out now and then to fill in forms. It's probably been a decade since I've used it. Uh, it's for sale if you're interested. Very low mileage.
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Old 04-15-2014, 10:33 AM
 
Location: Texas
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Default When did people stop using typewriters?

By the early 80s the secretaries at work were all using word processors instead of typewriters. By the late 80s, a buddy's wife showed me how to use Word Perfect on their home PC. Shortly afterwards, I had my first PC. But I used more for games than anything else until I got internet service.
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Old 04-15-2014, 10:38 AM
 
8,071 posts, read 9,985,879 times
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The end of the typewriter began in 1980. I was in a 'word processing' intensive environment, and I recall the evolution. In reality, it was quite swift.

The first version of change from the typewriter was something called a Mag Card Machine. You typed just as normal, but the 'words' were recorded on a magnetic card which was inserted into a 'card reader' in order to produce the typed page.

The next step was something called the Wang Word Processor. It was a single use machine, similar to a word processing program in a desk top computer today. You had the magic box, a terminal with green lettering, and it printed out on perforated paper which had an edge with holes in it to advance the sheet as the lines were printed out.

It was heaven compared to the 'old days'.

"Special" applications, such as envelops, and forms, were still done on a typewriter. Probably through much of the 80's into the very early 90's. By then, there might have been a typewriter or two sitting around under the plastic/vinyl cover, but they were doomed.

How do I remember this? I worked for a consulting firm in NYC. One of the Partners had taken a Request for Proposal (RFP) home with him on Friday night, and all us grunts were in the office on Saturday to respond to the Request. Except we didn't have the Request--it was in Connecticut.

The Partner dictated the RFP to a secretary who typed it out. She was pizzed, and the rest of us were really pizzed having to wait four hours for an a$$hole to read out the RFP while she took it down in shorthand and then typed it out.

That was the end of that. Shortly there after she had a Mag Card Machine. Such "modern' convenience. There was ONE in an office of probably a thousand typewriters. It didn't facilitate stupidity, but it made the endless 'corrections' a LOT easier.

Now, about the graphics artist who was literally cutting and pasting hand prepared charts, graphs and other diagrams....
Of course, the next evolution was a word processing program on a computer.
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Old 04-15-2014, 11:32 AM
 
Location: Ashburn, VA
2,794 posts, read 2,917,027 times
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I remember for typing classes when I was a freshman in high school a typewriter was still being used to teach typing.... that was back in 1998. Not sure how much longer that lasted...
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