Court Opinion

ID: 9654622
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 18:44:39.819763+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:13:11.860964
License: Public Domain

FINE, J.
¶ 45. (concurring in part; dissenting in part). I join in the Majority opinion except for its *642resolution of the PDF-costs issue. It is paradigm we apply statutes as they are written. State ex rel. Kalal v. Circuit Court, 2004 WI 58, ¶ 44, 271 Wis. 2d 633, 662, 681 N.W.2d 110, 123-124. The word "photocopying" has two discrete parts: (1) photo, and (2) copying; that is, making a copy using light.1 There is no dispute that a method of making PDF files is by using a photocopy machine — a scanner, much like a xerographic scanning bed.
¶ 46. There is also no dispute that Zurich American made the PDF copies for which it seeks costs by scanning paper documents. Rather than transmitting the resulting light-generated electronic impulses into a print head, Zurich American's device transmitted the impulses to a CD. In short, Zurich American took a "photo" of the documents (using its scanner) and then copied them to a CD; that is a "photocopy" no matter how "narrow" the word is read. I would grant Zurich American its request for $460.18 for "photocopies" as an item of costs under Wis. Stat. § 814.04(2). Accordingly, I respectfully concur in part and dissent in part.

 The Online Etymology Dictionary gives the origin of the word "photocopy":
photocopy (v.): 1924 in the sense of "make a photographic reproduction," from photo- "light" + copy (q.v.). The usual modern meaning arose 1942 with the advent of xerography. The noun is recorded from 1934. Photostat (1911) was a type of copying machine (trademark Commercial Camera Company, Providence, R.I.) whose name became a generic noun and verb (1914) for "photocopy."
http://www. etymonline.com/index.php?term=photocopy.