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Kumquat Printer Group Develops Renewable, Environmentally Friendly Source of Inkjet Ink

Kumquat's Ink Jet printers all need an abundant source of ink to keep printing those documents, diagrams and photographs our customers send to them every day. But ink doesn't grow on trees and finding new sources of black or multicolored ink is becoming a bigger and bigger challenge for the engineers at the Printing Systems Group in Helena, Montana.

"The ink manufacturing process is a messy one" said Senior Manager Ralph Plutarski. "Our janitorial costs at this plant alone have skyrocketed and I'd hate to even show you my monthly dry cleaning bills". And even worse, ink jet ink is made from imported petrochemical products. With rising oil prices and the overall market volatility in the petroleum sector, some analysts have predicted that ink supplies could run out as early as 2022 - or be priced out of the market. That would leave Kumquat with only two options - find a new source of ink, or start selling pencils.

Fortunately, a cooperative effort launched between Printing Systems and Kumquat Laboratories Ink Technologies Research in East Palo Alto has developed a completely new source of fully compatible ink supplies: octopus milking.

Octopus are a abundant and natural source of ink jet ink. Although currently they only produce black ink, an advanced genetic engineering project is underway at Kumquat to produce cyan, magenta and yellow octopuses. And planning is underway to create a four-way "quadra-pus" which can generate both black and the three primary colors on demand.

Current pilot line tests show that an average size octopus can generate enough ink to last 2-4 months of average printing us. For larger enterprise printers or for color photography imaging, either larger octopuses or a "octopus cluster" can be employed.

Many challenges remain. Plutarsky say "we've got the problem of octopus farming down pat. But many issues remain with packaging." 

Getting fresh, live octopus from the farm to the consumer is a daunting challenge. "The biggest issue is convincing the Walmart and Office Depots of the world that they'll need to set up a fresh seafood section in their stores". And consumers need to learn a few new skills to reload their printers. "It's really pretty easy" said Plutarsky. "Just follow the same 20-30 steps you currently follow when changing ink cartridges and just be sure the squirmy octopus you're wrestling with doesn't sting you when you firmly seat him in your printer's ink well".

What about recycling? That's a challenge the Kumquat team plans to investigate further down the road. For now, ecology conscience customers can use the the recipes provided with their instruction manuals. Fast high quality printing - and - fresh calamari. What will Kumquat think of next?

 

 

  
 
 

Note this is a parody. All persons and corporations mentioned are fictitious.