[HN Gopher] The tech that the US Post Office gave us
___________________________________________________________________
The tech that the US Post Office gave us
Author : 01-_-
Score : 50 points
Date : 2025-07-19 19:32 UTC (3 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.theverge.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.theverge.com)
| VWWHFSfQ wrote:
| I have been very pleasantly surprised by the usefulness of the
| USPS Informed Delivery [1] program which emails me pictures of
| the mail parcels arriving in the next day or two.
|
| > Today, the USPS's OCR technology can read handwritten mail at
| nearly 98 percent accuracy, while machine-printed addresses bump
| its accuracy to 99.5 percent.
|
| > [...] it first started using a handwriting recognition tool in
| 1999. The USPS is currently in the middle of a 10-year
| modernization plan, which includes investments in technology,
| such as AI. However, the plan has faced criticism for raising the
| price of stamps and causing service disruptions in some areas.
|
| $0.78 to send a letter or postcard anywhere in the USA seems so
| cheap that I don't think the "rising cost of stamps" could ever
| even cross my mind. I'm aware that it does matter to some people,
| though.
|
| I will, however, be glad if it becomes too expensive for spam
| mailers.
|
| [1] https://www.usps.com/manage/informed-delivery.htm
| ghaff wrote:
| >I will, however, be glad if it becomes too expensive for spam
| mailers.
|
| Which I assume still subsidizes first class mail.
|
| Honestly, it doesn't bother me a lot. Some I even find useful
| and the rest is quick to toss in the trash. There's actually a
| lot less than there sed to be with the decline in mailed
| catalogs and the like.
| SoftTalker wrote:
| Spam mailers don't pay the first-class rate. They get a
| discount and they must pre-sort their mail by carrier route.
| Sadly, junk mail is what keeps the postal service afloat. I
| note that they are also apparently selling ads on the informed
| delivery website.
| zevra wrote:
| The usps change of address form is a folded pamphlet with one
| section for the form and 2-3 for advertisments. More ads than
| paperwork
| mikestew wrote:
| You need not suffer spam in your mailbox if you've got $4. Lest
| I repeat myself: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36131222
| voxadam wrote:
| I remember reading an article eons ago about the tech used for
| OCR at USPS in what I'm pretry sure was _Wired_. If I remember
| correctly, on each sorting line they were using something like 10
| dual or quad 200 MHz Pentium Pro systems to accomplish the ultra
| high speed recognition that they required. That amount of
| computing power was absolutely mind bending to me at the time,
| now days it 's laughable, a Raspberry Pi would blow it out of the
| water.
| ctkhn wrote:
| My parents in the late 80s or early 90s had a computer with
| some low MB number for storage. Not sure if hard drive or what,
| but it's wild thinking about how far consumer stuff has come
| too.
| chaos_a wrote:
| https://archive.is/CTEtQ
| drewg123 wrote:
| My undergrad university was involved in developing hand-writing
| recognition for the postal service when I was there in the late
| 80s / early 90s (https://cedar.buffalo.edu/hwai/hwai_home.html).
| They brought in a ton of grant money, and even hired undergrads
| to help with the research. My roommate worked for them when we
| were seniors, and I was envious of the fact he had access to his
| own sparcstation. This was in a time where the undergrad labs
| just had VT-220 terminals connected to a shared and overloaded
| sparc server.
| beanjuiceII wrote:
| if only we kept up with that innovation...enterprise red tape is
| such a travesty
| lysace wrote:
| What happened?
|
| (Mostly separate: Not american, however I do feel the need to
| point out that The Postman (1997) featuring Kevin Costner is
| criminally underrated.)
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2025-07-19 23:01 UTC)