This paper proposes a theoretical framework for comparing the relationship of paper media and electronic media beginning with ancient Greek philosophy. It particularly focuses on maintaining an academic balance between the humanities and natural sciences. The adopted major academic areas include media theory, semiotics, developmental psychology, cognitive science as well as information theories. The decisive factors for selecting media are media's affinity for human beings and its hardware performance. This paper explains reasons behind the dominance of paper media for human intellectual progress. The mind-body dualism theory and related theories offer new insights into a variety of situations associated with media.

This study is a continuation of our previous study titled “Quantitative Analysis of the Differences in Consciousness and Behaviors Between Print Publication Users and Both Print and Electronic Publication Users,” the award-winning paper of The Japanese Society of Printing Science and Technology in 2020. To further develop the study, we conducted a survey on how readers use e-books and printed books differently. The results entail implications for promoting the use of each type of book, especially printed books.

Recently, the digital transformation of university libraries has been underway. The Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (2011) proposed the digitization of educational facilities of universities, such as libraries. In addition to e-journals and e-books, libraries also provide learning environments, such as Learning Commons, which rely on IT. However, many universities have not yet entirely harnessed the potential of IT. Library digitization has many benefits, such as cost and space savings, and e-libraries can support students' voluntary learning, such as PBL. However, problems with the university library organization's IT capabilities can hinder the implementation of e-libraries. We conducted a case study to analyze the IT capabilities of the Tokyo City University library organization. IT-CMF has been proposed as a framework for analyzing an organization's IT capabilities. A questionnaire survey based on the IT-CMF was conducted with the university library organization. We identified the IT capabilities needed for a university library. First, from a high-level survey, we identified five important capabilities needed for IT utilization, namely risk management (RM), sourcing (SRC), business process management (BPM), business planning (BP), and financing (FF). Second, for a more in-depth survey, we interviewed the director of the library organization and determined SRC as the most important IT capability. We thus identified goals and scopes (A2) as the crucial capability-building blocks of SRC.

Media are objects and devices used for recording, transmitting, and storing information. Not only is media an indispensable part of our lives, but its evolution has made our lives easier. The “Skin Display^®” developed by the authors does not lose its electrical and mechanical properties even when repeatedly expanded and contracted by 45%. Additionally, because it is thin, lightweight, and elastic, it does not hinder the movement of people even if directly attached to the skin. Further, the burden of wearing it can be greatly reduced. This paper provides an overview of how electronic media evolved as per our needs. Subsequently, it describes the design concept, functions, and application examples.