scanner head 30 is implemented by means of the scan head technology described in the previously incorporated u s patent application ser no 09 113 053 such a scanner has an output resolution of 4800 dpi it is further envisaged that the data card be produced using the very high resolution print heads described in the previously referred to u s patent application ser no 09 113 053 accordingly the amount of data that may be stored on a data card of dimensions 8 5 cm u00d7 5 cm 3 5 u2033 u00d7 2 u2033 is approximately 1 mb encoding of the text on to the data card may be performed as described in u s patent application ser no 09 112 781 which is hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety accordingly an entire novel may be stored on a single credit card sized plastic card by means of a pattern formed as an array of 16 million printed ink dots the manufacturing cost per card is less than 1 cent or about one fiftieth the cost of manufacturing a floppy disk while it is envisaged that the card be made of plastic it would also be possible to use other substrates such as paper while it is primarily envisaged that the data stored on the data card will correspond to the text of a book or magazine it is also possible to encode an executable program file accordingly.