For a lot of people, print is an old medium.  It’s quite stunning to scan live discussions where the word print is subject.  From now on you can follow those conversations on this blog:  http://resource.iheartprint.com

If you have an interesting feedlink to share, contact me at pieter [at] contentprint [dot] com.

They start with this explanation:

“Print is a wrok of art made up of ink on paper and existing in multiple examples.  It is created not by drawing directly on paper but through an indirect transfer process.  The artist begins by creating a composition on another surface and then transfer occurs when a sheet of paper, placed in contact with this surface, is run through a printing press.  Amongthe advantages of making an artwork in this way is that numerous “impressions” can be made, because new pieces of paper can be sent through the press in the same way.  The artist decides how many to make and the total number of impressions is called an edition.”

Visit the flash application here.

The project has apparently nothing to do with the Pedia Press project.

The official AP article concludes with following statement:

“The approach of ‘Wikipedia in One Volume’ is to give the people the information they are looking for,” he said, contrasting that approach to the process of publishing a traditional encyclopedia put together by a select group of people behind closed doors.

“This is the most important difference from traditional encyclopedias,” he said. “It’s also an important thing in that the sense of the Wikipedia spirit will go into this printed volume.”

I think that it is not the best way of using the power of print.  The power of Wikipedia is being an ever evolving online knowledge base, written by its users.  Giving the people what they are looking for, is already established.  On the internet, searchable, indexed with links as references.   People are printing articles from Wikipedia when they want to use it apart from their computer or desktops.  Presentation at school, project work, … The true power of print for Wikipedia is giving people such tools.  Offer them quality prints, booklets, presentations, … from articles they select.  Let them order as many items as they want to from those composed documents.

I find it hard to see a use for a yearbook of Wikipedia in a One Volume Printed edition.   To its end users there is no difference with a old fashioned encylopedia.  The difference should be made in the experience of consuming print, not in the offered content.

[lang_nl]De laatste tijd was het enorm druk op werkvlak, dat ik dit blog even alleen liet.  De nieuwe lay-out, die nog wel wat zal wijzigen, is meteen de restart van I Heart Print. [lang_nl]

Printstik, from Planon.

Printstik is a small (size: 11 x 1 x 1,5 inch, weigth: 0,5kg) device that can print up to three black and white pages in 60 seconds. Printstik has Bluetooth and USB connectivity. The lithium polymer battery inside is charged in 120 minutes. A Printstik with a full charged battery can print 30 pages.The Printstik doesn’t use ink but Direct Thermal printing as a technology. The device needs a cartridge to operate. A typical Printstik cartridge contains 20 sheets of paper. Planon states that this pocket size device is ruggdly designed for portable reliability.

The price of a Printstik is $299. You get a Printstik cartridge for $24.99.

Digital Instant Mobile Photo Printer from Polaroid.

Unlike its long name, the device is rather small. The tiny device (size: 4,7 x 2,8 x 0,9 inch, weigth: 0,26kg) prints a color photo (2 x 3 inch) in 60 seconds. The Polaroid Digital Instant Mobile Photo Printer has Bluetooth and USB 2.0 connectivity. A fully charged Lithium battery lets you print 15 photos. Plugged into the AC adapter, the Polaroid Mobile Photo Printer lets you print an unlimited amount of photos.

The Polaroid Digital Instant Mobile Photo Printer uses the ZINK technology. Zink stands for Zero INK. The inkless printing process embeds color into the Zink paper and prints dry to touch. Each photo comes as a sticker. The prints are water-, tear- and sumdgeproof. The Zink paper is a an advanced composite material with embdded yellow, magenta, cyan and dye crystals. Those crystals are activated with 200 million heat pulses in a single pass of 30 seconds.

These cool devices are announcing the start of an era where printing will be portable. Users are experiencing print in antother way. They will print less but efficient. [/lang_en]

[lang_en]One of Amnesty International’s missions is to free innocent prisoners. I remember writing letters in school for Amnesty. 10 letters per person was the aim. We did this with pen and paper.
In school projects it’s easy to sensibilize young people, but it takes a lot more to draw the attention of adults. According to the text on this poster Amnesty reached their goals within the first month.
“Total costs for the whole promotion were compensated within the first month and alltogether donations increased by 38 percent.”
This proves once again that personal and direct marketing has effect. Digital printing can support marketingcampaigns like this, as long as it’s served well.[lang_en]
[lang_nl]Eén van de opdrachten die Amnesty International zichzelf oplegt is het bevrijden van onschuldige gevangenen. Ik herinner mij dat we op school 10 brieven per leerling schreven. Handgeschreven brieven waren dat toen. Op school is het makkelijk om jongeren te sensibiliseren voor deze problematiek. Volwassenen tot beweging aanzetten is bijzonder moeilijk. Volgens de beschrijving op deze poster bereikte Amnesty hun doel binnen de eerste maand.
“De totale kost van de volledige campagne was gecompenseerd binnen de eerste maand en de algemene giften zijn gestegen met 38 procent.”
Dit bewijst nogmaals hoe sterk persoonlijke en directe marketing is. Digitaal drukken kan deze marketing campagnes ondersteunen, op voorwaarde dat de oplossingen juist ontwikkeld worden.[/lang_nl]

- Print providers will consider to recruit more knowledge workers next to craftsmen. As a consequence of that they will realize that differentiation is necessary.

The print industry is known as a slow mover, when it comes to technology and innovation. Despite that, 2008 will sure be the year to officially start playing the card of the knowledge worker. Print providers tend to hide themselves, fearing competition and suppliers. Blogs like http://printceoblog.com , http://lifeofprint.com , http://www.pixus.com/blog/, http://printfuture.ingridszurowski.de/, http://www.unioncopy.com/, http://projectcenter.wordpress.com/, http://blog.postful.com/, http://www.iheartprint.com, are proving that it’s worth to share knowledge and engage conversations.

That doesn’t mean we need to forget the operator and labor intensive jobs.

The ongoing pricing battle in the printing industry is perhaps due to the fact that we all do and think the same: putting ink on paper as cheap and fast as possible. In that thinking process we are cutting on budgets and employees, without being innovative. At the end we will lose all.

- Printing will shift from the product ‘ink on paper’ to ‘virtual content materialization’ and will shift from authority to experience.

Printing was for more than 100 years the king of content. Newspaper and magazines were considered as being trustworthy and valuable. Who needed to influence used those media. That has changed and printers need to realize that we can’t claim authority anymore. Since advertisers prefer online, because of obvious reasons: cheaper, measurable and highly personalisable, we need to think of other models where printing has advantage. One of them is the experience of reading. Amazon launched the Kindle as a digital reading machine. Reactions where great but I heard a lot of people who preferred the experience of holding and browsing a glossy magazine.

All source for print is virtual, and exists in more than just plain text. 3D printing is another experience that will gain ground in 2008. Not only will we be able to order our materialized virtual object, we will be able to produce it ourselves.
Threadless and alikes, with personalized t-shirts is also a great example of materialized virtual content to serve an experience.

Print will be more personal, delivered through several services.

Taking benefit of digital print solutions, print buyers will start realizing that printing can be personalized without extra costs. They will also be aware of the fact that personalized is more than name and address.

Print providers will differentiate themselves from others with building specific print solutions. iStockphoto selected this year an exclusive print provider: www.myphotopipe.com. Google acquired a patent for “Customization of content and advertisements in publication”. www.PediaPress.com leads Wikipedia into the world of print. But one of the most beautiful examples, for me this year, was www.postful.com.

- Standardization and measurement in (small) production.

Not only the manual process, but the workflow needs to be standardized. Perhaps JDF will gain more ground in small volume markets. I don’t know if it fits the needs for every case but it is a tool to start with. Workflows will function as frameworks for digital content printing.

Print providers will eventually see the benefit of production statistics, even in small volume printing.

Printing needs to be green.

Printing doesn’t mean delivering as much paper as possible. Printing needs to serve the need to inform, to entertain and to experience on the right material, in the right amount of that material.

The green thing isn’t a marketing tool anymore. It will become essential in surviving.
Machine suppliers are putting effort in waste collection, manufacturing bio degradable toners and ink, chloride free paper, … Print providers will start putting effort in educating their customers to buy green. Duplex printing and printing on recycled will be preached by providers.

What do you think of 2008 Feel free to add comments and remarks on thos five points. The print industry covers a lot, those thoughts are based on my experiences as a print provider.[/lang_en]

[lang_nl]De Nederlandstalige versie van deze post vind je op mijn persoonlijke blog.[/lang_nl]

The documentary ends with the quote ‘It will die, eventually. Because people will no longer remember how to do it.’ Does this mean that printing is not a craft anymore? Are printers replaced by robots? Do designers have to send their work to an automated site, and receive their work through mail? Of course not. Printing is still a craft, that needs respect an love. Every job in the world should be done with love. The art of the printing craft has changed, since digital print. Some printing providers don’t get that. It pushes them into the corner of robotic production, which squeezes out the soul of their work.

According to Wikipedia the definition of craft is : “A craft is a skill, especially involving practical arts. It may refer to a trade or particular art.” For me the craft of the printer today is shifted from labour to a technical, creative and social job. We need to listen to our customers first. If we are able to understand their needs, we need to serve them with the right solutions. Our job isn’t pure production. It’s the craft of knowing what’s possible and using that knowledge to build a personal solution for every client. Being a print provider requires other skills than some years ago. Implementing thos new skills in our industry, will bring the love back.

Merry Christmas to all the readers of this blog![/lang_en]

[lang_nl]Mocht je geen inspiratie hebben voor het dessert van het volgende kerst- of nieuwjaarsmaal, overweeg eens Typolade. Typolade is een Duits bedrijf dat letterpunches maakt van chocolade. De kans dat je het kunt gebruiken in Gutenberg’s movable type is klein. De letters zijn bestemd om op te eten. Op hun site Typolade.de geven ze verschillende suggesties om Typolade te presenteren.

Prettige kerstdagen aan alle lezers van dit blog[/lang_nl]

via: Wondering Boys.

The object, called ‘Plink jet’ is made out of four old inkjet printers.  It uses the back-and-forth mechanisms out of four old ink jet printers to slide up and down four guitar strings.  The machine or object is controlable with different knobs to adjust the pitch.  A rotor plugs the string and the former printhead presses on the string in different positions, in order to change the note that the rotor plays.

Her blog and project site feature some quicktime movies of the Plink Jet. [/lang_en]

[lang_nl]Lesley Flanigan, een studente aan het ITP (Interactive Telecommunications Program, NYC) en Andy Dorow, demonstreerden de  Plink Jet op de ITP Winter Show 2007.

Het toestel, Plink Jet, is gemaakt van vier oude inkjet printers.  Het maakt gebruik van het heen-en-weer bewegende mechanisme van vier oude inkjet printers om over vier gitaar snaren te glijden.  Het toestel kan bediend worden met verschillende knopjes om o.a. de snelheid van bewegen aan te passen.  Een rotor tokkelt op de snaar en de vroegere printkop glijdt over de snaar om van toon te veranderen.

Op haar blog en project site vind je enkele quicktime filmjes van de de Plink Jet.[/lang_nl]