The reason printers have this issue is because inkjet printers print microdots on each page to ID the unique printer used.
this post was submitted on 02 Mar 2026
416 points (99.8% liked)
History Memes
2306 readers
4 users here now
A place to share history memes!
Rules:
-
No sexism, racism, homophobia, transphobia, assorted bigotry, etc.
-
No fascism (including tankies/red fash), atrocity denial or apologia, etc.
-
Tag NSFW pics as NSFW.
-
Follow all Piefed.social rules.
-
History referenced must be 20+ years old.
Banner courtesy of @setsneedtofeed@lemmy.world
OTHER COMMS IN THE HISTORYVERSE:
- !historymusic@quokk.au
- !historygallery@quokk.au
- !historyruins@piefed.social
- !historyart@piefed.social
- !historyartifacts@piefed.social
- !historyphotos@piefed.social
founded 10 months ago
MODERATORS
I thought that usually used yellow
Maybe it does. It's been a long time since I looked into it.
It could also be an issue with how printers clean their jets. I know that uses ink as well.
True, that's the less noticeable colour. Magenta would have been a terrible (but amusing) choice.
No it's because they suck.
Isn't that really easily defeated by secondary selling?
If I buy a second hand printer there's no way to trade it back to me.
And what of laser printers?
They don't register the printer. If you're suspected of something and there is something printed as part of the evidence, they can then get a warrant and check if your printer matches. If you printed it and then destroyed the printer, then the tracking probably doesn't matter.
It's to link pieces of the same printed paper to the same printer and if they incriminated you they can cross reference.
For example printers detect and block printing money, but you manage to do it somehow they can trace the money back to the same source. Even if you are the first owner they can't trace it back to serial numbers because these aren't registered with a purchase.
This made me realize, I often see things about the invention of the printing press, but I know almost nothing about how color printing was developed. I’m sure it was obvious that early on that different colors could be used, I believe basically what is called spot color today, but I’d be far more curious about the development of process color to reproduce a full color spectrum.
My university advisor pranked me into taking a senior-level class on color theory from the college of art & design, which was interesting and an insane amount of work. The professor might have gone into it some but the main thing I remember was the way they used to use grid screens at different angles to make sure the different colors landed next to each other on the page and not on top of each other.
If you look at advertising posters up close they still put dots next to each other. Actually your phone screen works like that too
Yes, but with modern desktop publishing the computer software can decide where to put each pigment for best effect. A century earlier it was a completely mechanical/optical process that still produced decent results. It looks like halftone is the process name, but this was a class I took 20 years ago and I’m just skimming Wikipedia.
Don't forget the paper jams every 3 attempts