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Magic Paper Storage

I don't think any paper exists that has small enough flaws for this to even work(That is, if a scanner existed that could scan with high enough DPI)
 
The maths and technical aspects doesn't follow. If the originator was serious, he is not much of a technician. If he's not serious, it's a great object lesson for technical reporters!
 
I find it really highlights how little people know about scanners, printers and combinatorics. People's estimates of how much data can be stored vary WILDLY depending on where you go! Come on, people! Calculate the total number of possible states and take the base 2 logarithm for the number of bits! I find it especially annoying that people think it's somehow better to print a square instead of just printing the dots used to make that square individually.

One of the things I didn't realize about printers is that they can only really print in a very few number of colors, but they print them so close together that they blend together and appear to be another color.

Total bits:
lg(#colors ^ (dpi * width * dpi * height))
= dpi^2 * width * height * lg(#colors)

Assuming a dpi of 4000 (way more than what my printer can do at its top setting) and 16 color combinations (also slightly overestimated) on standard paper we get:
4000^2 * 8.5 * 11 * lg(16)
= 16 000 000 * 93.5 * 4
= 5 984 000 000 bits
= 748 000 000 bytes
~= 714 MB
and you'd be hard pressed to find a scanner accurate and fast enough to read these more accurately and faster than CDs.
 
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